This incredible Italian masterpiece, by a great auteur, is definitely one of the best films of the year.

It conveys a very important and true narrative that is ever relevant, and does so splendidly. The script is brilliant, subtle and perfectly paced.

The actors all do an incredible job, especially the lead, who manages to convey both sympathy and naracissism through his brilliant and subtle performance.

The cinematography, cutting and editing is incredible, as one would expect from such a great director.

Overall, truly a masterpiece in every sense of the word, and one that I would very much recommend for any lover of film. It is an ever important story!

The matter at hand is complex and controversial. There are beautiful poetry exchanges between the teacher and the young pupil, of whom we learn he is of age; there's clearly genuine affection and not just grooming (by the way, grooming in general is used not only when children are concerned). On the other hand, we learn that the teacher has taken advantage of - literally abused - other students who fell under his spell and intimidation. The other points are that there wouldn't be an issue were he heterosexual and abused girls; he would be praised for his machismo. Particularly harrowing is the ordeal of the boy who is forcibly institutionalised by his family and damaged through electroshock "treatment". I'm not sure where the director stands on this - on the one hand he portrays the accounts of boys who testify they were abused and even contemplated suicide; on the other, there's the tone of advocacy throughout - a fervent plea against the stigma on homosexuality, as if this were the only issue.

Aesthetically the film could be stronger; there are stretched episodes where not much is said or happens, as if we're supposed to get into the drama of the different characters intuitively - but they are given no background and remain vague. The forte is the poetry exchange and the ordeal of the young man, crippled and abandoned by his family. We learn he's also abandoned by the teacher, "the only one who cared" in his words.

P. S. On a second thought, poetry may be a sure form of grooming.

Gianni Amelio brings to the screen the story of Aldo Braibanti, an intellectual who at the end of the 1960s was convicted of plagiarizing Ettore, a young man who frequented the Tower, Braibanti's cultural centre. The intellectual from Piacenza is played well by Luigi Lo Cascio, but applause certainly goes to the young Leonardo Maltese who plays Ettore. The usually versatile Elio Germano takes on the role of Ennio Flaiano, the journalist of the Unità, a Communist newspaper, who immediately understands the delicacy of this process. The issues relating to civil rights begin to arise, but the country's culture is still anchored to the Catholic tradition, and Fascist heritage, which does not give any space to homosexuality. It is a film of shocking brutality, profound ignorance and Catholic bigotry. Anyone who thinks that things have changed consistently in Italy since then is grossly mistaken. It is sufficient to live in any of the small Italian provincial towns to still feel the same air of profound obscurantism and Catholic suffocation.