"The Tree Of Life," Hava Volterra's new documentary about her journey to Italy to trace the roots of her Jewish ancestors is a personal family saga that illuminates the fascinating history of the Jews of Italy. The film follows the Israeli-born director, an engineer in Los Angeles, as she struggles to come to terms with her father's death by traveling to Italy, the land of his birth, to trace the roots of his family tree. Beginning in the ancient Adriatic city of Ancona, Volterra and her feisty
82-year-old Aunt Viviana travel extensively through Italy, digging up rare historical manuscripts, interviewing an array of quirky historians, and discovering the astonishing and humorous stories of their ancestors, including moneylenders and bankers in Florence of the Medici; a prominent Venetian rabbi and mystic involved in the Kabbalah; a mathematician who headed Italy's academy of sciences in the early 1900s; Italy's first Jewish prime minister, and finally, a prominent Italian-American politician whose name will be familiar to all New Yorkers. The film also includes the poignant reunion of Viviana with the Italian family who sheltered her and Ms. Volterra's father from the Nazis during WWII.
Ms. Volterra, acting as narrator and interviewee herself, can't seem to resist the urge to be the star of her own film, which too often feels like a wearisome exercise in self-therapy.
Vivid animation, illustrations and puppetry lighten up interviews and elementary reflections on a personal history of Jews in Italy, better left to a family reunion.
[Volterra's] affinity for Italian stereotypes is countered with delightful truculence by the film's most engaging character, her down-to-earth octogenarian aunt Viviana.
...absorbing, mysterious, lyrical and distinctively titillating...a moody masterpiece that is thrillingly alarming...[a] tale of wandering hedonism and anguish
A character study about characters I never cared about, Tre features actors whose acting shows. Never for a minute did I buy that the characters they were trying to create were real.
[Byler] ventures into Douglas Sirk territory with astonishing skill (not an easy task), presenting this potential melodrama with gravity and intelligence.
I saw it last night. I really want to see it again. Parts of it were confusing to me, but I was impressed. I will wait until the DVD comes out to see it again.
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