Unexpectedly romantic and touching! This tale that happens during the summer of love in the year 1983 was a critical darling that managed to nab the Oscar for adapted screenplay. The story revolves around Elio, a cultivated teenager from a small town in Northern Italy who becomes trapped in the "mystery of love" when an american arrives to do some work with his father. Unlike last year's Moonlight who had a more expository role in describing three stages in the life of a young gay man, Call Me by Your Name takes its time with the lead, making us more familiar with the environment first. There's a constant warm feeling throughout, the summers are incredibly hot and Guadagnino has a beautiful way of showcasing it by using perfect photography on the trees, rivers, sweat and the overabundence of flies. Elio's passion for culture reflects into reading and playing the piano as he's waiting for the summer to pass. Timothee Chalamet deserves all the praise in the world for this strong and very hard to portray take on a coming of age story. In a brief scene, a character tells him the people who read are hiders and they don't like who they are and it perfectly fits as Elio searches for all the answers in the books until life decides to teach him a lesson. By the time they fall for each other, you're completely invested in their bittersweet moments, and come the end you'll probably even shed a tear. There are some scenes of profound sensibility as when after they separate Elio calls his mom to pick him up and he bursts into tears. There's an amazing monologue from his father: "I may have come close but I never had what you two have" and a final gut punching scene where they say goodbye to each other possibly for ever on the phone, while Sufjan Stevens' Vision of Gideon starts playing. The camera stays on Chalamet's face as he's taking in all the sorrow and then finally is ready to let go. A remarkable piece of work from Guadagnino that has plenty of things to say about love, with a delicate, warm feeling. One of the best films of the year! Daniel Craciun

Working both as a prequel and as a sequel to the original 1972 masterpiece, The Godfather: Part 2 feels more as an operatic and more complete story of decay, sin and moral ambiguity within the Corleone mafia family. The two main storylines show the contrast between the two Dons, as we get an inside on how similar and different in the same time they are and how they manage to climb on the social class. Whilst Vito (in a beautifully nuanced performance by a young De Niro) has humble beginnings, starting as a store clerk, but through a sheer of circumstances manages to take his shot and climb, Michael continues his legacy with an iron fist and not taking any risks, ordering the hits on every family who try to make him an enemy: „If history has taught us but one thing is that you can kill anyone!” It’s here where the movie works as a Shakesperean tragedy, a story about a man who is winning everything, who ends up being at the top, but losing everything and everyone in the same time. Al Pacino’s magnetic and sometimes understated performance ranges from a flawed father and husband to a confident and untouchable mobster, a cruel Don feared by everyone around him. The scene in which he talks with his ageing mother about his fear of losing the ones he holds dear always strikes as the best and most truthfully humane, and represents the moral core of the story as it brings in context yet again the importance of family. This is why the ending, in which we see a solemn Michael, sitting in the chair, all alone, staring in the abyss is so powerful. Robert De Niro’s portrayal of young Vito Corleone is one of an ambitious and intelligent young man, that learns the value of respect and loyalty in a foreign country. While his narrative opens with the killing of his brother and mother, at the hands of the local sicillian boss, it also ends with his personal vendetta against him, and his success in launching the most powerful mafia family. So, if Michael’s story is one of a moral failure, Vito’s is one of triumph against all odds. It’s one of the many reasons why this film works so well even now. It’s almost a parody and an ironic look at the American dream. Copolla’s direction is subtle and epic in the same time, relying on scenes in which his characters act unexpectedly, with a lot of dark nuances in the color palette of the film’s latter half. He also manages to avoid exposition at all costs. The longest and the darkest in the trilogy, The Godfather: Part 2 is the best one, not because it’s bigger and broader, but because it’s bold and it takes risks, it expands its characters and universe while remaining true to them, and by the end you’re compelled by the magnitude and power of it. Daniel Craciun