The Eight Mountains ★★★★☆
Films that span from childhood into adult years are notoriously difficult to pull off, yet The Eight Mountains manages it with consummate ease. Adapted from Paolo Cognetti’s award-winning 2016 bestselling novel, Le Otto Montagne, it’s a story of male friendship and the undulating emotions that bubble away beneath the surface. When the film screened in competition at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, winning a share of the jury prize with Jerzy Skolimowski’s recently released donkey-centric tale EO, critics hailed it as ‘the straight Brokeback Mountain’, a rather reductive description of two lifelong companions at the heart of this film.
True, there is no latent sexual attraction to contend with here, nor is it a film about the over-tired theme of toxic masculinity. Instead, it’s a story that begins in childhood when 11-year-old Pietro (Lupo Barbiero) accompanies his mother on vacation to a village in the Italian Alps. The year is 1984, and it’s here that he meets Bruno (Cristiano Sassella), a boy his own age, who clambers around the rocky terrain with all the dexterity of a mountain goat. They couldn’t be more different, but they find solace in each other’s company. So much so, Pietro’s parents suggest bringing Bruno back to Turin to help educate him. Needless to say, the boy’s construction worker father reacts angrily to the suggestion.
After years apart, Pietro (now played by Luca Marinelli, the distinct, blue-eyed star of 2019’s Martin Eden) returns to the Alps, where Bruno (Alessandro Borghi) still lives. They quickly fall into each other’s company again. Bruno is now a farmer while Pietro is an aspiring writer. They spend the summer rebuilding the dilapidated mountain-side shack once owned by Pietro’s late father, finding simple pleasures in the majesty of Mother Nature. Women also enter their orbits, although these relationships always somehow seem secondary.
Behind the camera is Felix van Groeningen, the Belgian filmmaker behind The Broken Circle Breakdown (2012) and Beautiful Boy (2018), his English-language debut which starred Steve Carell and Timothée Chalamet as father-and-son in a harrowing tale of drug addiction. Here, he’s joined by his wife, actress Charlotte Vandermeersch, who co-starred in van Groeningen’s 2009 breakout film The Misfortunates. Together, they co-direct seamlessly, immersing the audience not only in the rugged mountainous terrain but also authentic rural Italian life.
Filmed in the boxy Academy 4:3 ratio (given the vistas that form the film’s backdrop, a daring artistic decision that typifies this project), The Eight Mountains is a leisurely, contemplative film, but one that pulls you in as you become familiar, friendly even, with the two central characters. Bolstered by Swedish singer-songwriter Daniel Norgren’s score, it’s a gentle experience, but a deeply affecting one. Childhood, adulthood and the transition between them has rarely been so skilfully expressed on screen.