Luca Guadagnino's advice: "Rewatch The Godfather III at Christmas"
The acclaimed director revealed his favorite films and those that, on the other hand, he is not passionate about
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Alongside names like Stefano Sollima and Paolo Sorrentino, who have crossed national borders attracting further consensus in the foreign market, an Italian filmmaker with whom all international stars have been aspiring to collaborate for a few years is undoubtedly Luca Guadagnino . Born in 1971 to a Sicilian father and an Algerian mother, the director began his career on the eve of the 2000s, quickly establishing a professional exchange with British actress Tilda Swinton and welcoming increasingly high-sounding names within the star system at each new appointment: from Ralph Finnes, to Armie Hammer to Dakota Johnson; without obviously forgetting Timothée Chalamet, who rose to the top of Hollywood's new promises with his performance in "Call Me By Your Name" . More recently, Guadagnino directed the young Zendaya and Josh O'Connor in the gripping “Challengers,” and recently attended the Venice Film Festival with the preview of his latest “Queer,” alongside “007” star Daniel Craig.
Among the awards at the most prestigious festivals, the director can boast an Oscar nomination for best film, the victory of the Silver Lion in Venice in 2022 and four nominations for the next edition of the Golden Globes.
He is currently busy completing his tenth film, “ After The Hunt,” which is expected in 2025 and stars Andrew Garfield and Julia Roberts. With a number of successes and a high level of media attention behind him, Guadagnino has often taken the opportunity to talk about cinema and express his opinions on the works of other filmmakers.
In a recent interview with Sing and Sound, he gave some recommendations for titles to catch up on during the holiday season. Recalling a timeless classic, Guadagnino suggests rewatching “The Godfather: Part III,” considering it not only a hugely underrated film, but also the best of the entire trilogy. Explaining his impressions, he said: “This year I will definitely watch The Godfather: Part III. For me, it’s the best film of the trilogy. Part II is too perfect and The Godfather is too legendary. But Part III has the ambition of a man who has done it all, but who also deals with the fragility of someone who is entering a more mature phase of their life, in a job that is now sold out. It’s a film imbued with a poignant melancholy... It has similarities to another of my favorite films, John Huston’s The Dead.”
Also claiming that watching the film fits with her Christmas habits, she added: “ My Christmas is usually quite quiet: we don’t have a big family and we’re not many people. It’s nice to enjoy the winter silence and immerse yourself in a film like this. I have time to do it, without phone calls or work to disturb. The length of the film - 2 hours and 42 minutes - is perfect for this moment of pause. However, I recommend you watch the original version from 1990, not the one reworked by Coppola: that is a masterpiece”.
On other Oscar-winning and box-office hits like “La La Land,” the filmmaker has instead signaled his dissent . In a 2017 interview published before the release of “Call Me By Your Name,” he listed the most deserving titles of 2016 and those, in his opinion, the most disappointing. Starting with “The Revenant” by Alejandro Iñárritu, he called it “very bad”; on “Youth” by Paolo Sorrentino he said: “Michael Caine in a Swiss sanatorium. Horrible”; on “The Lobster” by Yorgos Lanthimos he declared instead: “Terrible. Too cynical. I hated it!”; and the aforementioned “La La Land” by Damien Chazelle he labeled as a “bad and sappy” film.
Among those that have managed to attract his approval are Quentin Tarantino's "The Hateful Eight" and Barry Jenkins' "Moonlight", the latter considered "very passionate". Among other news that interest the director is his involvement in the remake of "American Psycho", a 2000 film with Christian Bale based on the novel of the same name by Bret Easton Ellis. Currently in development for Lionsgate, the title will star the young star Austin Butler in the role of Patrick Bateman, recently seen in Baz Luhrmann's "Elvis" and Denis Villeneuve's "Dune - Part 2".
