Living in a lavish if ancient apartment situated in the heart of Rome with his 93-year-old mother (Valeria De Franciscis), middle-aged Gianni (director and screenwriter Gianni Di Gregorio) is forced by circumstance to allow three elderly women to stay in his home over Italy’s biggest holiday the Pranzo di Ferragosto weekend. While at first everyone has trouble getting along, as the weekend progresses friendships develop that prove to be exactly what each of them were looking for.

Valeria De Franciscis in Zeitgeist Films' Mid-August Lunch

One of the writers behind 2008’s international sensation Gomorra, Di Gregorio’s directorial debut Mid-August Lunch (Pranzo di Ferragosto) is a sprightly food-obsessed lark whose simplicity belies its emotional ebullience. The film has a humanity that is relatively surprising, and while little of consequence actually happens the journey each of its five central characters goes on is one I could handle experiencing sitting in the theatre far more often.

I loved the way Gianni and his mother initially deal with the geriatric intrusion into their lives. Both of them realize they must acquiesce and let these boarders stay with them (they haven’t paid their bills in months and doing this will clear many of them up) but neither want to change the simplicity of their lives dealing with them. They enjoy the mundane, like debating D'Artagnan’s virility in “The Three Musketeers” or watching the nightly news on their rundown television.

But as the new arrivals begin to make their presences known parent and child are almost surprised to find their hardened hearts begin to soften. They’ve cut themselves off for so long this new blood inside the apartment invigorates the both of them, the three elderly women as eager to make new connections as their present benefactors appear at least upon the surface to want to avoid them. Soon this thrown together quintet is making the most of their holiday weekend at home, the sound of a ringing telephone signaling its potential end a cause for mourning.

It sometimes amazes me how friendships can be forged. The strongest I’ve known in my lifetime have often happened under circumstances so strange most people would never believe them. But that’s the way things can go from time to time, and the connections we make in our youth and take for granted are the ones we usually regret the losing of the most when we get older.

Di Gregorio seems to understand this beautifully, his movie grasping the nature of life’s cruelty in regards to family, friendship and aging and how the most minute nicety can forge an almost cement bond between those who are either unused to experiencing them or have watched to many fade away with time. The climactic dinner echoes with a beautifully constructed warm-heartedness that filled me with joy, and like the characters I didn't want to see it end. 

As the group dance the remaining hours of their day away I couldn’t help but be struck by the fact at just how much I enjoyed Mid-August Lunch. A simple, almost overly theatrical film that doesn’t break new ground or try to buck convention, all the same this movie made me smile and left me with a cheery glow. It was easy to drink down and a pleasure to eat up, and while it didn’t blow my mind or rock my world it left me fully satiated to the point I hungered not a single ounce for more.

Film Rating: êêê (out of 4)  

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