Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Bianca Come Il Latte, Rossa Come il Sangue dir. by Giacomo Campiotti



I think writing a story about cancer, especially cancer in young adults, is one of the hardest endeavors for an author. Cancer is no doubt very prevalent in our world today, and most people know someone affected by it, but to adress it from an artistic viewpoint, as of an author or film maker, I don't think cancer can be the subject of the work. Sure, you can write a story about a kid who has cancer, but what's the point? Without some kind of underlying idea-which the movie is really about- it's just a very depressing "Ok, but so what?"

Having read John Green's acclaimed The Fault In Our Stars before watching this movie, I already had some ideas about what works in a cancer story and what doesn't, and I think being able to compare the two stories gave me a better understanding of how I felt about each. In my opinion, Bianca Come Il Latte, Rossa Come Il Sangue worked much better as a cancer love story that The Fault In Our Stars

Bianca Come Il Latte is an Italian movie directed by Giacomo Campiotti, starring Filippo Scicchitano as Leo, the free-spirited tenth grader that falls in love with the beautiful red-haired eleventh-grade Beatrice (Gaia Weiss). The movie was adapted from the book by the same name, written by Alessandro D'Avenia. Leo is a bit of a rebel, playing truant and biking around Turin, where the movie takes place. His best friends are Niko and Silvia, Silvia being the brains of the operation. At the beginning of the story, Leo is in the midst of an obsession with the eleventh-grader Beatrice, who moved from France. She's gorgeous, mysterious, and he's trying to work up the nerve to talk to her. The first time he says hello is in a movie theater he followed her to, where he trips over her bag in the isle and she smiles and says she'll see him at school. The problem is she doesn't come back to school. He finds out she has cancer, and that she's ended up in the hospital being treated with chemotherapy. If she doesn't get a bone marrow donor she'll die, but no one is compatible. When she comes home from the hospital Leo starts visiting her, and they form a friendship he hopes will turn into something more, while at the same time desperately wishing for her to get better.


I'm not quite sure why the way to go about addressing cancer is with a love story- it was the same in The Fault In Our Stars. I would imagine being sick is a very internal struggle- that if you knew you may die soon there would be a lot of deep thought going on inside, trying to sort out your beliefs before you don't have any time left. But considering that it was a love story, the relationship between Leo and Bea was written very charmingly but also in a touching and realistic way. 
Bea knows right from the start how Leo feels about her- he doesn't try to hide it. Although it feels like she perhaps doesn't reciprocate quite those same sentiments, she's very gentle and nice to Leo, and really values his friendship. He makes her smile when she's in a tough situation, and he wants to listen to her when she talks about her struggles and emotions. But even though Bea is the sick one, she actually helps Leo. In her he finds a passion for something, a will to do good, that he didn't really have before. He donates bone marrow even when he finds out she isn't a match, because he genuinely wants to help someone else out there. 
Silvia, Leo's best friend, has had a crush on him since eighth grade, and Bea knows this. Because she truly cares about Leo, she wants him to end up with the person he really loves, and she can sense that even though he is enamored of her, Silvia is the one who is really important to him. Bea isn't bitter- she helps sort things out between them. I liked that the author/director didn't use a love triangle as a source of drama in the story. Instead he dealt with it in a very caring and understanding way, where all the characters seemed to have a real sense of what was going on. I also appreciate that Leo was allowed to love someone other than the cancer patient. Their friendship was touching, but Bea having cancer didn't change how Leo felt about Silvia. I feel like this gave a certain amount of respect to Bea's character- having cancer was only a part of her character, and it didn't make Leo love her more than he already did.

I sort of had to roll my eyes at the teacher. It's become such an archetype by now; the language teacher that becomes a friend and inspiration(see: The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Dead Poet's Society) It wasn't really an original character, and I didn't think he had too much of an impact on the story. However, I did like that instead of talking to Leo about his problems he boxed with him- it was an acknowledgement to the fact that meaningful quotes and metaphors can't fix too many problems in real life- they're a luxury those without problems can afford.


It was a good move to tell the story from Leo's perspective. It worked to show how cancer affects everyone, both the patients and the people that they might not even know would be affected. In the end, a really positive message was able to be pulled from the story- live for today, love for today, because things like sickness strike without warning and you'll end up wishing you had acted on all the dreams you dreamt.

The movie definitely made more of an impact on me that TFIOS book did. It wasn't an incredibly artistic or creative movie, but it provided two hours of insight into the effects of the sickness of one girl and connected lives of those around her. I'm thinking of ordering the original book in Italian- although I'm only just learning to speak Italian, I'm sure with some work I could translate it.

1 comment:

  1. I haven't read TFIOS but this movie sounds interesting, thanks for sharing this!

    E fantastico quel tu studiando italiano! =D Ehh, I'm actually very rusty with my Italian right now, been meaning to brush up big time. Buying novels definitely helps ;) (and watching movies...and listening to music :)) Have fun studying it!

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