Fabrizio De André - Free Prince, review. Or maybe: some notes and some details on the film dedicated to Faber. To that Genoese genius who unhinged the canons of Italian song. The chansonnier par excellence. Fleeting, irreverent, lashing and subversive. Immense. A crazy pulsation that captures the soul, the telescope of our desire. The film traces 40 years of private life, from early adolescence, between the alleys of Genoa and the squares to kidnapping in Sardinia.
Fabrizio De André - Free Prince, review
Before going into the film review, we need to make a small premise. Fabrizio De Andrè - Free Prince is a film created and developed to have a television cut. The lovers of the artist, those who know the entire discography by heart, should not be criticized. There are no insights. No criticism or careful scrutiny. The film is a splendid short story, poetic storytelling with a light touch of his private life. Luca Marinelli, the face chosen for the songwriter, represents and does not interpret. It does not indulge, it does not pursue, it does not pretend, but it honors. There are no makers, no masks. Marinelli seems to have De Andrè on his skin. The opening words are dazzling. The background is that of the school run by the Jesuits where De André experiences the confrontation with the last ones; with the outcasts of society. Her romantic anarchy begins to emerge among the people she has crossed paths with.
The cornerstones like Paolo Villaggio, played by Gianluca Gobbi. Luigi Tenco played by Matteo Martari, the actress Orietta Notari in the role of Fernanda Pivano and the graceful alleys; Fabrizio's only and true companions. And again: the bourgeois salons "to talk about nothing" and where he will also meet Puny (Elena Radoninich), his first wife and mother of Cristiano. A film that unfolds between characters and great feelings and precious ideologies. Freedom, the undisputed co-star, sometimes rebellious and other times artistic. A freedom that embraces the body and mind and that finds its fulfillment in the purchase of a Sardinian farm together with the new partner, Dori Ghezzi, played by Valentina Bellè. The birth of Luvi, happiness, joy and retaliation. The lack of light, the denial of freedom in the kidnapping.
"I am a free prince and I have as much authority to make war on the whole world as he who has a hundred ships at sea"
The soundtrack, with the exception of a short parenthesis dedicated to Mozart, is entirely by the singer-songwriter and this makes up for the few spaces dedicated to his career. The fixed points, however, are not lacking. The first performances for friends with Paolo Villaggio. The first record deal. The first concert took place after seventeen years of the publication of the first album. The meeting with the PFM. Fabrizio De André - Principe Libero focuses on personal relationships and private life. The bond with the father, an example of a brilliant dichotomy. Austere, dedicated to work, who tries to direct his children to brilliant careers, but who, moved by Fabrizio's talent, gives him a guitar («I thought it's nice that where my fingers end should somehow start a guitar "). The relationships of the adult De André with his wives and children.
The film will be broadcast on TV, divided into two parts, on 13 and 14 February on Rai 1. In the words of Dori Ghezzi «This film will appeal to those who have really known Fabrizio because they will find him again, while those who have only imagined it will perhaps feel betrayed". I would also add that those who put prejudices under the sofa will like it. To those who will let themselves be involved by the voice and movements of Marinelli, one of the most gifted and most important actors of his generation. To all those who will be able to breathe the air of those alleys in Luca Facchini's biopic. In the sigh of poetry, in traveling behind the scenes in the company of an artist who could not stand the bourgeois extraction in favor of free people and far from social constructs. Fabrizio De André - Principe Libero is dedicated to all those who know that "From diamonds nothing comes from manure flowers are born."
