HAPPY AS LAZZARO

Anyone familiar with the promotional material will have no doubt seen Lazzaro’s cherubic, rather expressionless face. He is primed for exploitation and cruelty, it seems, a pure symbol of innocence of unexplained origin amongst the dirty clothes and rough hands of his fellow workers. Surely there must be something else bubbling behind those blue eyes. Spending much of the first act of the film as a secondary character constantly being given work to complete, Lazzaro’s whirlwind and risky friendship with Tancredi (Luca Chikovani) changes all that. Tardiolo exercises an incredible level of restraint in his performance that allows him to delve deeper into his character's desires and inner workings without betraying it on his face, even as he is beaten by a group of civilians. While no doubt the mark of a talented actor, Lazzaro’s blank slate is both the film's best friend and worst enemy.

As ‘Happy as Lazzaro’ bends away from the exploitative drama of the first act and leans into the fantastical, the film deliberately splits itself into two halves, as a cliff dive (I mean this literally) launches audiences into a fable-style, surrealist story that acts as part allegory, part satire. Admittedly, it is wonderful to look at, but unfortunately not as compelling as it wants to be. Through such a major shift, it would be helpful to have a more concrete figure of theme and meaning to tie the two halves of the film together, but instead we have Lazzaro. Unchanged both physically and spiritually despite the massive switch in gears the film takes on, what the character is actually meant to represent to the audience is left far too ambiguous for the two halves of the film to really work. Perhaps, like the film, Lazzaro himself is taking on double meanings and representations. Perhaps he is more symbol than character, a move that may alienate audiences in its abstractness.

‘Happy as Lazzaro’ comes and goes like an airy fable but doesn’t make as much of an impact as it wants to. Through a lack of convincing and earned pivot, its first half in realism drags down the escapism it yearns for in its second half. Its ambition is to be commended and is definitely a film that deserves to be seen, but as a whole is just verging on greatness.