More "The Beauty of Women" and "The Paradise of the Ladies" than "Women" by George Cukor or "8 Women and a Mystery" by Ozon. The latest Ozpeteck film is a uterine and dramatic work, not without flashes of comedy. It is a feminist melodrama and metacinematic, with references to the director’s biography.

The Canova tailoring shop, run by two sisters, is tasked with creating costumes for an important film. A series of seamstresses, each with a troubled private life, work day and night to complete the job. There is one with a violent husband (how original!), another who has a relationship with a much younger man, and another who has a depressed son who never leaves his room….

We are in Rome in the 1970s, but Ozpeteck creates a self-contained microcosm, separate from the political turmoil that filled the streets of the city during that time. There are very few outdoor scenes, Diamanti is almost entirely set inside the tailoring shop and in the small apartments of the protagonists. The director’s spotlight is on the female world and its many facets. Women like diamonds: precious, indestructible, with multifaceted personalities. Like Almodóvar, Ozpeteck loves to tell stories of female solidarity, doing so in such an extreme way that it feels almost fairy-tale-like and surreal.

The institutional and conventional family is replaced by one made up entirely of women who move sinuously, painfully, angrily, melancholically, generously, kindly, irascibly, in love, disappointed, aroused, sensual, and confused. Their problems are solved through the generosity and advice of the various members of the group, unlike their biological families, which are almost always founded on seemingly unsolvable problems, where the male figure is either violent or passive. However, the director does not simplify the male figure, making a clear separation between women/good and men/bad, and through the character of Luca Barbarossa, he also portrays a compassionate and gentle man.

It is said that every director eventually makes their own personal 8½ or Amarcord. It was so for Truffaut with Day for Night, for Ferrara with Snake Eyes, for Woody Allen with Stardust Memories, and for Paolo Sorrentino with It Was the Hand of God—films that blend autobiographical fragments and a passion for cinema and turn into metacinematic works that speak about and show the process of making movies. Diamanti is exactly that: it's Ozpeteck playing with his actresses on his terrace, lovingly teasing them, bringing them together not only to admire their careers and artistic talents, but also their personalities. And so the film begins with tables full of food, the songs of Mina and Patty Pravo being belted out, witty remarks, and shots of men reduced to mere decoration. In short, Ozpeteck keeps making more or less the same film, just like Almodóvar or Dolan, but he doesn’t have the same auteur strength as his colleagues. And while Pedro and Xavier craft surgical scripts, Ferzan doesn’t always manage to balance his. The many micro-stories that make up Diamanti are essentially trivial both in development and resolution; some characters have more storytelling depth than others, but what is certain is the triumph of the happy ending. The many little stories that create a heterogeneous mosaic are less impactful than the ensemble moments, even if the parts set in the present, where the actresses read and discuss the script, feel somewhat disconnected from the rest of the film and break up an otherwise engaging and immersive narrative.

The eighteen actresses involved play along. Luisa Ranieri shines, The Trinca is sorrowful, Paola Minaccioni and Giuppi Cucciari are overwhelming, Carla Signoris is over the top, as is Milena Mancini. Mara Venier is generous and melancholic. Stefano Accorsi’s hairstyle is atrocious (you haven’t seen a wig this bad since Pasotti’s in Kiss Me Again).

Once again, as in the previous New Olympus, Ozpeteck celebrates cinema and the power it has over people’s lives.

05-Jan-2025 by Emanuele