LE QUATTRO VOLTE – The Review

Hot on the heels of THE TREE OF LIFE comes this Italian import that also uses an unusual narrative style, although this film has a more linear form of storytelling. Michaelangelo Frammartino’s LE QUATTRO VOLTE examines the circle of life that is part of a tiny village in the southern Italian region of Calabria. These stories are told visually with no pertinent dialogue ( hence no subtitles ). Luckily those visuals are quite stunning.

Through the first minutes of the film, the camera follows the simple life of a shepherd as he goes about his daily rituals in the care of his flock of goats. After returning them to heir pen, he goes to church and collects a packet of dirt from a woman who sweeps  there. Arriving at his threadbare home, the old man mixes the dirt into a glass of water and gulps it down before retiring for the night. This is his daily routine until tragedy strikes. The film’s focus then shifts to a newborn goat. We follow him as he tries to re-connect with his mother. The film then follows a large tree as it is cut down and becomes part of a village festival. After the celebration, the tree then embarks on another journey.

The word journey about sums up the film’s themes. The old shepherd is at the end of his  life’s journey when we meet him. We get to see almost all of the baby goat’s journey including a remarkable birth sequence. As I stated earlier, there’s no real dialogue and no narration. The camera observes the events of the village. Frammartino paints lovely pictures of the surroundings. He cuts in for some intimate closeups especially with the shepherd’s story. Several times the camera functions as God watching down from the heavens particularly in one long amazing uncut scene of a religious reenactment that turn into a comic catastrophe. I’ve you’ve the patience for the slow pace of this simple life , then you may be transported by this almost documentary look at these very different journeys.

Overall Rating: Three Out of Five Stars