A country torn apart by the First World War. A people mourning over 650,000 fallen in the trenches. Politicians humiliated at the Versailles peace table. A poet-soldier who draws crowds to every rally. A city that becomes an emblem of irredentist and nationalist claims. It was in this Italy that the Fiume enterprise began on 12 September 1919: the adventure of Grabiele d'Annunzio and a handful of legionnaires who set out from Ronchi in Friuli, against the will of the established power, to occupy the Adriatic city and annex it to Italy, establish the Regency of Carnaro, and found a 'myth' destined to influence Italian and international culture and politics, aesthetics and vocabulary, well beyond the Twenty Years of Fascism.
When you first hear that there is a series on Netflix where the lead character’s wife dies from cancer and he becomes dangerously suicidal, you wouldn’t immediately assume that it’s a comedy.
As this critic continues to look back at some of this Summer's films I have taken in, I would be remiss if I didn't mention one of the most overall unsettling trends in Hollywood over the last several years.....sequels, reboots, and remakes. Look, I am all for seeing more than one film for certain originals that made a splash, ie: "Jurassic Park", "Pirates of the Caribbean", "Transformers", etc.
In Saudi Arabia, a little girl (Wadjda) is told she can't have a bike because she's a girl. Wadjda struggles to obtain a bicycle to race her friend, Abdullah, due to the gender inequality and cultural norms of Saudi Arabia.
Some moments of the series are intense and ends on a cliff-hanger that will have you yearning for a second season.
Two young girls meet in the same neighborhood unexpectedly as they embark on a new adventure using their imaginations as this movie brings strong representation among women.
An aspect of She-Ra that I find refreshing is even though a large portion of the cast is on the LGBTQ+ Spectrum, being gay is never mentioned. While this might initially sound like a negative thing, in the show’s land of Etheria being on the gay spectrum is shown to be so common and normalized that straight isn’t the default. As much as there is to appreciate about narratives revolving around the obstacles that may come from being non-heteronormative, it’s nice to get immersed in a world where no one bats an eye at all to any sort of differing identity.
