Spettacolo

The elegiac Spettacolo is in some ways a familiar story, revolving around the universal tug of war between time and tradition.

Theater lovers and Italophiles alike should savor the documentary Spettacolo.

Is this art or is this prophecy? Is there even a difference?

Although Spettacolo is thoughtful and charming throughout, it’s mildly disappointing that the film doesn’t further engage with the self-reflexivity of the annual event itself.

Though some of Spettacolo's tension is superficial, the stuff of any let’s-put-on-a-show narrative, its latent anxieties are myriad and profoundly resonant.

Though at its core the film is about a dying way of life, the location and photography here are so beguiling that they semi-perversely encourage just the kind of foreign tourism that factors into that slow death.

If Spettacolo has a significant flaw, it is in the somewhat pedestrian and placid manner in which it is constructed. There is the feeling that the directors see the play as a vehicle in order to explore the town as a whole, which does allow for some lovely moments of contemplation but makes the film less focused and motivated as a whole.