Starring:
Distributor: Italian Film Festival
Runtime: 108 mins. Reviewed in Sep 2023
Reviewer: Fr Peter Malone msc
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A significant documentary about primary school children, it was filmed over a period of five years, beginning when the children at the centre of the film were five and six, moving through each year until they came to the end of the primary school period, aged 11 to 12.
This is a film for parents and teachers. It is an opportunity to listen to the children, the issues they raise, their interactions with one another, the growing sense of responsibility . . . But the film would also be very interesting to children, for parents and teachers to gauge the children’s response, empathies, critiques.
The film was made in Rome in a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic neighbourhood. Some of the children remain at the same school over the period of the five years, while others come to the school after being bullied at another school, and some are the children of migrants.
And the title? The basic idea is for the children to meet regularly, supervised by the teacher, but not in a formal classroom situation, a free circle where topics are raised, questions asked by the teacher but the camera not on the teacher, an opportunity for children to act their age. The camera is firmly focused on the children, a great number of close-ups, extreme close-ups of faces, gathering the range of expressions, spontaneous responses.
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