Melissa P [DVD]

Judging by the cover you'd expect some kind of teen-(soft)porn. Well, it isn't. No full frontal nudity, just a few short topless scenes. Yes, there are some erotic scenes but these are more a matter of suggestion than anything else. So if it isn't porn, then why the "18" rating? Please do tell me...
As far as I can see this is just a well acted and quite believable story about a sensitive and yes, sensuous, girl who tries to find some kind of solace in sexual contacts that could be potentially harmful but in her case only serve to heal, thanks to her inner strenght and basic mental health.
And BTW: Geraldine Chaplin makes a quite lovable granny...

There's likely to be renewed interest in this earlier 2005 film from Luca Guadagnino, but try as you might to find something that makes a viewing worthwhile, there's little here in Melissa P that indicates that this is a film by a director capable of making a film of the scale and ambition of the extraordinary I Am Love.

Based on a bestselling account of a teenage girl's exploration of her sexuality from innocent infatuation through wild abandon to self-degradation, the material here is certainly controversial, but it feels wilfully so, and in reality never produces anything that is groundbreaking or insightful on the experience of growing up. Structured into four seasons, adopting a diary-entry point-of-view of a fifteen year-old girl, the content is appropriately juvenile, and never achieves anything like true authenticity in the increasingly absurd, clearly fantasised situations that Melissa undergoes with all the teenage boys looking like male models with their defined sculptured musculature.

There's no sign at all here of the tremendous capability to explore intense inner emotions and psychological states that Guadagnino would later demonstrate in I Am Love, but really there's little call in the material for anything other than surface impressions and superficiality, and the director perhaps appropriately gives this its due with soft-core lighting and tastefully-shot nudity. The relationship between Melissa and her grandmother however - sensitively played by Geraldine Chaplin - is the only part of the film that has anything like a ring of truth in the story of Melissa P, or any recognisable situation that the viewer can engage with, and it is indeed beautifully handled.

The DVD itself looks fine, with the original Italian soundtrack in Dolby Digital 5.1 and a number of dubs provided in other languages. Extras include a full length director's commentary (subtitled) and a standard EPK making-of. Although advertised on the cover, there are no deleted scenes.

Based on the book "One hundred strokes of the brush before bed" (which I haven't read), this film describes the descent of a young girl into a series of increasingly unwise sexual encounters. It is far less explicit than the UK's 18 certificate might suggest (unless nipples on display are nowadays sufficient reason to slap the red badge on), and it is far better than any of the comments I have read would give it credit for.

As parents we do need to be aware that for vulnerable girls, who may be low on self-esteem, there are very real dangers arising from their sexuality and from its ruthless exploitation by men of all ages. The recent phenomenon of the "loverboys" in the Netherlands, who coax schoolgirls into prostitution, shows that this is not as rare as we might have hoped.

The film handles this difficult subject tactfully. For instance, the nudity is only on display when Melissa is ensconced in the comfort of her home, either alone in her room, or in the bathroom with her beloved grandmother (whose nipples are also revealed in an old photograph - maybe that pushed the censors over the edge?). On the other hand, the more dangerous her encounters with men become, the less we get to see of them, and the more is left to the viewer's imagination.

The film only makes limited use of language - as I understood most of the Italian without ever having learned that language, it can't have involved any sophisticated phrases. I`m guessing this may be on purpose, as the body and visual languages are more important to the protagonists and the movie, and lead actress Maria Velverde can express herself very eloquently without saying a word.

On the visual side, I loved the locations chosen with a great sense of place and visual effect, such as the descent into the improbably cavernous historic basement which ends up being a descent in more than one way.

Here's another film condemned to the trash bin by people who can't see past a bare chest, and that's a shame.