Andrew DiStefano directs an all-Italian film. Setting, cast and above all a story that tells a Milan of today, of the underworld and the police. Close relations between the Calabrian “families” and the Chinese mafia for a widespread illegal business in which the policeman Franco Amore enters, for better or for worse (Pierfrancesco Favino) that on the threshold of retirement, convinced of creating a more solid future than that guaranteed by the INPS, promises himself to the Chinese underworld for a supervisory role.
But things don’t go the right way, the descent into hell is increasingly steep and icy and in a single night, everything falls into the void. “The Last Night of Love” is a succession of twists and turns that at dawn leads everyone towards a solution that seems precariously balanced.
Di Stefano’s film appears rich and pleasant, but it seems designed to be shot in the USA, for the relationships between colleagues, for both personal and legal dynamics that often clash with the Italian reality which is instead very characterized and present. The succession of events seems created and pushed to be able to move the story forward. When any person would have stepped back, waited for the morning, watched without intervening, waited at home or in the car, it’s time to make an unintelligent move that only serves to fuel the story.
In addition to the policeman Favino, good as usual at stepping into anyone’s shoes and inflection, we find in the cast Linda Caridi, his perfect Calabrian wife, true head of the family of character and initiative. Perhaps too much initiative that clashes with common sense and intelligence.
By and large “The Last Night of Love” is an enjoyable film, which keeps the attention high by mixing crime and poliziottesco (right from the first notes of the soundtrack), updating the Italian genre towards an internationalization that in some ways works and in others still doesn’t.
24/02/2023, 23:00
Stephen Amadio