Director: Ferzan Ozpetek
Starring: Giovanna Mezzogiorno, Massimo Girotti, Raoul Bova, Filippo Nigro, Serra Yilmaz, Maria Grazia Bon, Massimo Poggio, Ivan Bacchi

- Reviewed by Linda

What can I say? If a movie is worthy, I'm a sucker for swelling violins. Directors know that if you are already feeling even slightly moved by a scene, a rush of violins in the soundtrack will break open the dam of your tearducts. Let's just say that sniffles were to be had throughout the whole screening of Facing Windows (and I wasn't the only one).

Director Ferzan Ozpetek juggles a few storylines, and intertwines them by circumstance. Giovanna and Filippo (Giovanna Mezzogiorno and Filippo Nigro) are a young couple seemingly on the outs, despite the two children and warm home that they have created together. Both are unhappy—with their jobs (he works graveyard, she works at a chicken factory, and makes and sells pastries on the side), and with each other. On the way home one day, they come across a confused old man (Massimo Girotti). He is well-dressed, and clutches a wad of money in his hand, asking for help. He doesn't remember who he is, his name, or where he lives. Kind-hearted Filippo, against the protests of his wife, decides to help him, and they take him home. The old gentlemen works his way into their lives, first causing friction (Giovanna wants him out), but then seems to become the distraction that the family needed.

In the meantime, Giovanna daydreams about the hot stud who lives in the neighboring apartment. He, with his Clark Kent glasses, square jaw, and string of girlfriends, seems to represent an alluring lifestyle that is beyond the confines of her world. So when the neighbor hottie hurriedly approaches Giovanna at a bar to say that he found her "grandfather" (the old man) wandering down the street lost, the opportunity to "get to know him" falls in her lap.

Without giving too much away, part of the pleasure of Facing Windows is that the plots and tangents gradually unfold. We find out some of the old man's past via flashbacks to World War II, and are fed an emerging tale of his lost love. Giovanna's flirtation with the neighbor Lorenzo first seems typical, then takes an unexpected turn. And we see Giovanna grow as an independent woman, remembering how it was to have the passion to take control of her life, and make it the best it can be.

Facing Windows is a multi-layered drama, with complex, real characters. It takes its time in its storytelling, almost like reading a good novel. And it also rewards those who are patient, with its ultimately uplifting and realistic ending.

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