David’s Birthday [Il Compleanno] ** (2009, Alessandro Gassmann, Maria de Medeiros, Massimo Poggio, Thyago Alves) – Classic Movie Review 12,805

The 2009 gay-themed Italian romantic drama film David’s Birthday [Il Compleanno] stars Alessandro Gassmann, Maria de Medeiros, Massimo Poggio and Thyago Alves as free-spirited birthday boy David.

Director Marco Filiberti’s 2009 gay-themed Italian romantic drama film David’s Birthday [Il Compleanno] stars Alessandro Gassmann, Maria de Medeiros, Massimo Poggio, Michela Cesco, and Thyago Alves as liberated, free-spirited birthday boy David.

A group of friends decide to rent a magnificent house by the sea for the summer at the foot of Mount Circeo in Italy. The arrival of David (Thyago Alves), the grown-up son of Shary (Michela Cesco) and Diego (Alessandro Gassmann), excites everyone, especially Matteo (Massimo Poggio), a sensitive, intelligent psychoanalyst married to Francesca (Maria de Medeiros), with whom he has a five-year-old daughter, Elena. David’s lonely enigmatic uncle Leonard (Christo Jivkov) understands the situation’s dangerous tension. He’s excited too and wants to spirit the boy off.

It seems that everybody wants to make love to David (Thyago Alves), understandably so, because he’s a calendar boy wet dream. This finally leads to a bit of a problem on his birthday when he comes back from college in the US to celebrate it by the beach with his parents, whom he hasn’t seen in five years. Psychologist Matteo (Massimo Poggio) is a tormented soul, unhappily married to the boyish Francesca (Maria de Medeiros), and finds David much more interesting.

It’s quite compelling and entertaining but feels very old fashioned and dated, instead of intellectual, sensual and daring as was obviously intended, though it is still slightly all of those things. The characters are extremely self-involved and unsympathetic, a real problem to enjoyment. Massimo Poggio gives by far the best performance, heartfelt and even reasonably subtle. Thyago Alves is just used as a sex object, so the actor is given no chance to act, Gassmann is wasted in a rotten role as David’s dull dad Diego, and the female characters are especially unsympathetic.

The ‘Liebestod’ from Wagner’s ‘Tristan und Isolde’s begins and ends the film. Its meaning for the film is not very subtle, and you could certainly argue that the film is unintentionally homophobic, as accepting and enjoying gay love in the story leads to tragedy and death. Is Death in Venice homophobic? Maybe it is then, or maybe not. It depends how you look at it.

On the other hand in Il Compleanno, Matteo finally gets up the courage to get it on with David, and all would have been great if he wasn’t married to the neurotic Francesca. And David is a well-adjusted free spirit who seems to be entirely enjoying his coming of age. Only the straight folks are simple minded and prejudiced, and destroyed in the story! Okay, then, mixed messages.

The cast are Alessandro Gassmann as Diego, Massimo Poggio as Matteo, Maria de Medeiros as Francesca, Michela Cescon as Shary, Thyago Alves as David, Christo Jivkov as Leonard, Piera Degli Esposti as Giuliana, Daniele De Angelis as Orazio, and Marianna De Rossi as Chicca.

© Derek Winnert 2024 – Classic Movie Review 12,805

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