Grimaldi's elegantly understated film is a Groundhog Day of grief suppressed and life suspended.
Comment
10/20/08
Quiet Chaos (2009)
79
%
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Reviews Counted:33
Fresh:26
Rotten:7
Average Rating:6.4/10
Consensus: An understated and thoughtful insight into grief and despair, with a stellar turn from Nanni Moretti.
Theatrical Release:Jun 26, 2009 Limited
Synopsis: Nanni Moretti stars in and co-wrote this moving Italian drama about grief. Pietro (Moretti) has just lost his wife, and he is left alone with their young daughter (Blu Yoshimi). He promises the... [More]
Starring: Nanni Moretti, Valeria Golino, Isabella Ferrari, Alessandro Gassman
Director: Antonello Grimaldi
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Reviews for Quiet Chaos
It's watchable and fluent, but there is something narcissistic and conceited in Moretti's performance.
10/24/08
A thoughtful portrait of the purgatory of grief that prefers small incidences and exchanges over grand gestures of sentiment and revelation. It’s sad – but never cloying.
10/24/08
Some of the plot is implausible, yet the core ideas resonate richly, and the characters' behaviour is psychologically intriguing.
05/22/09
For a far superior meditation on bereavement, better to turn to Moretti's portrayal of a grieving father in 2002's The Son's Room.
10/24/08
This is a slow-burning, very well acted film that contains, almost disconcertingly, a graphic sex scene, a strange star-cameo very late on, and something close to a Hollywood ending.
10/24/08
[Nanni] Moretti makes this 'study' in despair a naggingly neutral, at times borderline coy experience.
07/22/09
Top CriticIt's subtle stuff with an appealing lack of contrivance and there is something very natural about its resolution.
05/22/09
But on balance, they're outweighed by some striking and funny moments, and Moretti's immensely charming, reassuring presence.
10/24/08
Quiet Chaos feels thin and, especially towards the end, increasingly implausible. All the same, Moretti’s simpatico screen persona just about carries it.
10/24/08
Quiet Chaos is an apt description for the emotional state of Nanni Moretti's grieving widower Pietro, in a film whose central theme is grief, but that plays out with a mix of humour and acceptance
05/16/09
Moretti, present in nearly every scene, like an open wound, is ineffably empathetic.
10/24/08
The boldest stroke in Nanni Moretti’s Quiet Chaos is in what it doesn’t do, rather than what it does.
10/24/08
Quiet Chaos is understated and restrained, perhaps too much so.
10/24/08
Moretti's performance -- unusually for an actor whose chief trait is sardonic superiority - mines a vein of self-doubt and frail desperation that, together with his tender relationship with his daughter, gives Quiet Chaos a broad human touch.
10/18/08
Grimaldi’s sensitive direction, allied to a subtle score by Paolo Buonvino, sharp script and accomplished acting, helps to turn this into an original and complex study of the unpredictability of human foibles and weaknesses.
05/28/09
Moretti gives his usual excellent performance. But the script throws in too many other elements while it should be concentrating on the father-daughter relationship.
06/26/09
Top Critic[Moretti delivers] a complex and complete performance...
05/22/09
Quiet Chaos has strength and insight about the experiences that cause us to change direction in life.
05/22/09
Unfortunately, Quiet Chaos can’t help but become heated, and a ridiculous climax sabotages much of the emotional weight.
06/25/09
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