Ginia, 16, left her country village for the city of Turin with her brother. The ingenuous teenager delights in a life of little things in which she works as a seamstress in a fashion workshop. His simple manners seduce Amelia, who despite her young age, leads an existence considered profane under fascist Italy.
Amelia, brought to the screen by Deva Cassel, is tall, beautiful, reckless, and is a model for a small circle of Turin painters. Ginia, the young girl who is good in every way, lets herself be caught up in the magnetism of transgression and develops a devouring passion for her friend. With an almost disturbing mimicry, Ginia abandons her passion for sewing, despised by the small bourgeois world of painting, to try to become a model, like the one who becomes the object of her fantasies, her friend Amelia.
This romance between two women, in a corseted Italy, depicts the contours of a relationship that is both toxic and immature. The main character, played by Yile Yara Vianello, takes her first steps into the “forbidden zone” not without stumbling. By being around her friend, Ginia changes and disguises herself, hurting herself. A malaise admirably transcribed in a scene in which the adolescent strips herself naked in front of the painters only to end up in tears faced with the bitter disillusionment of having set foot in a world that cannot be hers.
The film “La Bella estate”, based on the eponymous novel by Cesare Pavese and presented at the Locarno Festival, is Laura Luchetti's third film. Through her mastery of lighting, her careful transcription of the decor and costumes of fascist Italy at the end of the 1930s, the Italian director creates a feature film that deserves to be seen.
Deva Cassel convinces as a young woman with hypnotic beauty and a vampiric inclination.
La Bella estate can be seen this Wednesday, November 27 in French cinemas.
