A must watch for all movie buffs

I am a very ego-centric person and very much passionate about movies. When someone hits out at my passion i first try to get acquainted with that. One such incident occurred recently when the now showing host rajeev masand said that
"if you are a movie buff and still dint watch nuovo cinema(read it as chinema) paradiso
then dont claim to be a movie buff"

That was it. Those 3 minutes of sneak preview into the movie made me determined to watch that one. Since the cd libraries in my part of the world doesnt even have a pather panchali or a ritwik ghatak work expecting cinema paradiso is as preposterous as kavya vishwanathan claiming that she plagiarised unknowingly. So thanks to bit lord i found its torrent file online.

Cinema paradiso is an italian flick. I am a kind of person who fervently feels that movies have an universal appeal and language is no barrier. Enough of my personal homily i guess.

Nuovo cinema paradiso(released in 1989),set in a small italian town called giancaldo, is about a small boy named tito who adores movies and has a movie operator named alfredo (portrayed extremely well by philip noiret)as a close buddy. Their scenes are the most cherished moments of the film. Cinema paradiso pays homage to cinema and its audience and more importantly to the people in the operating room.

Since the downloaded file did not have any subtitles i found wanting over there. But the brilliant fotografia by blasco giurato made up for that. His lens captivated the beauty of giancaldo. It was as refreshing an experiene as watching wyoming hill in brokeback mountain. The musiche by ennio morricone elevates the mood of the film. My stand out scene where the violin strings literally uplifted the mood of the film is when a boy on cycle traverses from one theatre to another.

Due credit must be given to giuseppe tornatore for showing the machinations and proceedings in a theatre. Be it the gasps of the bishop at watching a smooch or the sly breast feeding of an infant or children masturbating while looking at a love making scene or the covert tit pressing or the novel way of censoring by playing a bell whenever a smooch appears or the crying of an elderly gentleman while looking at a mawkish scene. Some of the scenes may appear outrageous but no one can deny them.

The movie shows the paradigm shifts occuring through the aging process of the boy. A small boy first plays the black and white version(considering the fact that the movie is based in 1954). Then the young tito gets to operate on an eastman color reel. When his mother avers that the job is no sinecure he reluctantly joins military. And when he comes back to his roots the whole town changes but only superficially.

But the director keeps the best at the ending. The scene where the grown up guy(quite a sturdy one) watches all those edited kisses gave me goose flesh.
Well people , if your life is screwed up really badly and you need a job pretty desperately then this movie is a must watch. The whole process of playing a movie on that machine is so intricately explained that you can make a living by playing reel.
FINE.