"Mar Nero" ("Black Sea")
This was a true treat of a film.
A tightly-woven story of an aging Italian woman, Gemma, who has just recently lost her husband. Harsh and bitter in her treatment of others, she reluctantly accepts her Romanian immigrant caretaker, Angela, into her life. We journey with Gemma as Angela helps her overcome her grief and open her eyes once again towards an unknown future.
Set against the economic and political backdrop reflecting Romania's integration into the European Union, this is a film about tolerance, acceptance, forgiveness, and most of all -- hope.
There is a masterful scene in this film which is wordless but speaks volumes. Gemma awakes in the middle of the night to an unknown buzzing sound. We follow her as she discovers that the sound is emanating from her deceased husband's electric shaver, in its case in a bathroom cabinet. At the kitchen table she cleans and collects her husband's whiskers from the shaver, clutches them tightly in the palm of her hand, and then throws them away in the garbage, indicating her readiness to now move on.
There is not a wasted element of this story. Both actresses are wonderful in this beautiful film.
A deeply moving and universal film.
