La stanza del figlio

Italy

Synopsis

Giovanni, Paola, and their teenage children Irene and Andrea, live in a small town in Northern Italy. Giovanni is a psychiatrist. Day after day his patients confide in him, the endless details of their neuroses contrasting sharply with his own ordered life. Giovanni's existence is one of strictly observed habits, even compulsions: he reads, listens to music, exhausts himself with long, lonely runs across town.

One morning, Giovanni receives an urgent call from a patent and is unable to go running with his son as he had planned. Andrea goes diving with friends instead. He will not return ...

Director's Statement

In LA STANZA DEL FIGLIO, I felt the urgent need to relate this pain, the death of a loved one, the different ways in which those close to the victim react to his death. I really felt an important need to make this story into a film. I have never felt so involved in the feelings of a film as in this case. This had never happened to me before.

I had already written the treatment for the film after DEAR DIARY. Where does it come from? Partly due to the fact that as time goes on, one starts to think more and more about death. It is not connected at all to my cancer because at that time I was never afraid of dying. I just haven't had time to make this film up until now. It concerns the death of others. How does one react to the death of a loved one? What is life like after the death of another person? As one grows older, one starts to think more and more about death and so, naturally it's a fear that I have tried to confront by directing a film about it.

So I had the treatment after DEAR DIARY. But at that point in time, at the end of 1995, something distanced me from it. I was expecting a child and, quite frankly, it didn't think it seemed right, to continue writing and then make a film about the death of a child during Silvia's pregnancy or during the first few months of this child's life. I couldn't do it. I didn't want to either. So I put the treatment of LA STANZA DEL FIGLIO to one side knowing that, whatever happened, this was the film I would make later on. Once I had completed APRILE, I started to write the script with two other people: one was Heidrun Schleef,a screenplay writer, and the other was Linda Ferri, an author.
 | 

Cast & Crew

Directed by: Nanni Moretti

Written by: Linda Ferri, Nanni Moretti, Heidrun Schleef

Produced by: Nanni Moretti, Angelo Barbagallo

Cinematography: Giuseppe Lanci

Editing: Esmeralda Calabria

Production Design: Giancarlo Basili

Costume Design: Mariarita Barbera

Original Score: Nicola Piovani

Cast: Nanni Moretti (Giovanni), Laura Morante (Paola), Jasmine Trinca (Irene), Giuseppe Sanfelice (Andrea)

Nominations and Awards

  • People's Choice Award 2001
  • European Film 2001
  • European Actress 2001
  • Feature Film Selection 2001