Pulce Is Not Here ( Pulce non c'è )

Pulce Is Not Here (DVD) (*)

$26.99

Original Title: Pulce non c'è
Screened, competed or awarded at:
Other Film Festival Awards

Language Selections:
English ( Subtitles )
French ( Subtitles )
Italian ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
Italian ( Dolby Digital 5.1 )
Italian ( Subtitles )

Product Origin/Format:
Italy ( PAL/Region 2 )

Running Time:
96 min

Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen (2.35:1)

Special Features:
Behind the scenes
Interactive Menu
Music Video
Photo Gallery
Scene Access
Trailer(s)

Movie filmed in 2012 and produced in:
Italy ( Italy, Greece )

Directed By:
Giuseppe Bonito

Written By:
Gaia Rayneri
Monica Zapelli

Actors:
Pippo Delbono ..... Gualtiero
Marina Massironi ..... Anita
Piera Degli Esposti ..... Nonna Carmen
Francesca Di Benedetto ..... Giovanna
Ludovica Falda ..... Pulce
Giorgio Colangeli ..... Dottor Martello
Elisa Catale ..... Pippa
Anna Ferruzzo ..... Oriana
Rosanna Gentili ..... Maestra Penelope
Alberto Gimignani ..... Dottor Castelli
Lucia Vasini ..... Lucett
Tiziana Catalano ..... Professoressa Garfagnino
Giusi Merli ..... Donna Pennacchio
Francesco Rossini ..... Dottor Contengo
Franco Ferronato ..... Maresciallo

Synopsis:

Pulce, a nine-year-old non-verbal autistic girl, communicates continually even though she cannot speak. She listens to the tango, drinks only tamarind, loves panda teddy bears and pecorino cheese, and in between happiness and nocturnal meltdowns, lives the serene existence of an ordinary family life. On a day like any other, she is taken away from the family without any explanation, her father the victim of a monstrous accusation. Set in Torino and observed through the wandering, dreamy gaze of her thirteen-year-old sister, Giovanna, we enter the daily life of Pulce's abnormal family with its language devised for someone who can only speak through images; a family whose chaos is full of emergencies and love. Without rhetoric or pathos, we explore the clash between the adult world and that of children, between illness and normality, between the rigidity of institutions and emotional bonds, and the normality of a family facing the absurdities of Kafka-like bureaucracy. The film won the Special Jury Prize in the Alice nella città section at Rome Film Festival 2012.

The story is set in Turin and seen through the eyes of a candid, vagrant Giovanna, thirteen-year-old sister to Margherita, nicknamed Pulce, who is nine and autistic. Pulce only drinks tamarind, loves panda teddy bears and pecorino cheese and in between happiness and nocturnal meltdowns, lives the serene existence of a normal family life. One day, while her mother is waiting for her outside of school, the daughter doesn't show up. It transpires she has been taken, for unknown reasons, to a protected facility. Later, the parents will come to know that the father is being accused of abusing his child, something which teachers think they have discovered through the method of 'facilitated communication' (which provides for interaction through computer generated questions and answers). The method has not been proven though, and the teachers' training was never completed due to lack of funding. The parents are forced into long legal procedures to get out of this nightmare. Bonito reveals the normality of a family facing the abnormality of bureaucracy, underlining its Kafka-type absurdities (Giovanna actually studies Kafka at school). But he develops them with a simplicity which reduces situations and makes protagonists' reactions banal.

Pulce is nine years old, has bright eyes filled with wonder, and listens only to tango. She does not speak because she is autistic, but this does not mean that she has nothing to say. One day, like any other, she is taken away from the family without much explanation. Her father must face a terrible accusation. Through the vital, candid gaze of Pulce's teenage sister, Giovanna, we are led into the everyday lives of an abnormal family. We learn their special language created to reach out to someone who speaks only in images. We are plunged into a family's chaos that is yet so filled with urgency and love. Without rhetoric or pathos, we explore the confrontation between the world of adults and the world of children, between illness and normality, between institutional rigidity and human tenderness. And, we share all of Giovanna's teenage astonishment as she discovers the world of adults, the awakening of her own body, and that strange and indefinable mystery of life called love.

This product was added to our catalog on Friday 04 December, 2015.