International Feature Oscar Race: Read Variety Reviews of Shortlisted Titles and Submissions From More Than 50 Other Countries

International Feature Oscar Race: Read Variety Reviews of Shortlisted Titles and Submissions From More Than 50 Other Countries

Italian director Maura Delpero‘s quietly breathtaking “Vermiglio” unfolds from tiny tactile details … into a momentous vision of everyday rural existence in the high Italian Alps. Far away, the Second World War is ending — an earthshaking event felt here only in abstract ways. The remarkable, raw-boned and ravishing “Vermiglio” takes place in the past but operates like a future family secret playing out in the present tense, a perspective that is not quite Godlike, but comes from that which we might as well call God — the spirit of the mothers and the sisters and the daughters who came before and after, and who trusted the imperious mountains to keep their secrets. — Jessica Kiang

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