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‘Parthenope’ Review: Paolo Sorrentino Crafts an Exquisite Treatise on Cinematic Beauty
Celeste Dalla Porta delivers a dynamic lead performance in Paolo Sorretino's beguiling Neapolitan drama 'Parthenope.'
Her beauty, she is told — by a small but surprising character played by Gary Oldman — will open doors and start wars, and neither Della Porta nor Sorrentino shy away from presenting Parthenope as a carefree seductress who revels in her youth. Along the way, a family tragedy sends her emotionally adrift, and as she’s ushered toward becoming a star of the silver screen, her conversations with older actresses considered past their prime (owing to age, botched cosmetic surgeries and falling hair) illuminate the nature of her own desires — romantic, academic and otherwise. Each scene unfolds in dreamlike fashion despite being tethered to reality, thanks in large part to Lele Marchitelli ‘s operatic score, and to the Neapolitan setting, whose most traditionally (and even non-traditionally) beautiful men and women weave in and out of Parthenope’s story.
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