Sara Petraglia L'albero Drama • 2024 • 1h 32m

Bianca moves into a shared apartment with Angelica in Pigneto, Rome, an area popular with young people and close to La Sapienza University. From a window, one can see a majestic pine tree. Although Bianca is theoretically enrolled at university, in reality, she drifts in an almost ethereal dimension, trapped in a bond with her friend that fluctuates between affection and the illusion of a sentimental reciprocity that has never fully materialized.

Her inner world is fed by intense readings, with Leopardi as a companion in her melancholies, and fragments of writing that remain suspended between the desire to create and the impossibility of overcoming an unresolved existential knot: grass, synthetic drugs, and cocaine addiction, shared with her friend, become a ritual of an elusive existence. Every experience for Bianca dissolves as quickly as it emerges: love, the perception of time, the very sense of her presence in the world.

Their nocturnal wanderings through Roman clubs, in a directionless escape, will eventually lead them to Naples. Beyond the abandonment foretold by Angelica, the real dramatic core of the film lies in Bianca's inner struggle with her addiction, a conflict that manifests both in economic and emotional dimensions, forcing her into choices that fluctuate between conviction and resignation. In the background, there is the presence of another friend, afflicted by an illness that represents another piece of this fragile and precarious existential condition.

Sara Petraglia’s film attempts to give voice to a fragment of a generation. The search for an expressive sobriety does not stand out for particular stylistic insights. The minimalism of the dialogues and the convincing performance of the protagonists make the viewing smooth, but not necessarily impactful. The portrayal of these young people, lost between anxieties, uncertain aspirations, and a constant sense of emotional precariousness, aligns with a type of storytelling that has become commonplace, neither surprising nor forcefully imposing.

The idea seems intriguing but not fully grounded. The tendency to delve into the existential drifts of younger generations feels like a cinematic déjà vu. There is a multiplication of stories centered on adolescents from the urban bourgeoisie, far from the Pasolinian archetypes of extreme marginality. There is also a constant focus on a female point of view, often framed in an intimate key and free from excessive dramatic flourishes. However, beyond these common characteristics, the feeling is that it all remains within a narrative comfort zone, an exercise in observation rather than a true immersion into an authentic generational sentiment.

A rather conventional film, a work destined not to leave an indelible mark. An honest story, certainly, but one that risks dissolving into the familiarity of cinema that looks around with grace but lacks the courage to push further.