Lo chiamavano Jeeg Robot (2015)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2015
	Director: Gabriele Mainetti
	Actors: Claudio Santamaria, Luca Marinelli, Stefano Ambrogi
	Country: I
	Genre: Drama, Thriller, SF
	Conditions of visioning: 07.07.2016, Theatre des Arcades, NIFFF2016
Synopsis:  Enzo (Santamaria), a lowlife criminal, almost drowns in the Tiber after escaping from the police. During his next job for a small group lead by Lo Zingaro (Marinelli) his friend dies, he has to take care of his daughter Alessai and he discovers his new super-human strengh.
Review: Selling this movie as an Italian Avengers is largely exaggerated, but the thing is that it doesn't try to be. When it starts with a very down-to-earth chase in the streets of Rome, I thought that it definitely couldn't be the place for a Marvel-type super-hero, the depicted world being far too realistic. Indeed we follow a group of characters that have human problems and ambitions, even though one of them shows some traits of a supervillain-to-be, but always put back in the context of our current world as his main concern is to look good on YouTube. On the other side, our hero is actually one of the best anti-hero I have ever seen on screen, even less concerned by the rest of the world than Riddick in Pitch Black or Snake Plissken in John Carpenter's Escape from New York. In fact it would be better compared to the one in Jumper or the character played Will Smith in Hancock, without the success of the first or the fame of the second. A very interesting character well played by a placid Claudio Santamaria. Another excellent idea in the movie is to side the hero with an innocent girl traumatized since her mother's death, and who will play both the role of confident, girlfriend and teaching him how to use his powers. And the whole story unfolds with in background news of terrorist attacks in the Italian capital. Quite actual. During the session of Q&A to the director presenting Lo chiamavano Jeeg Robot at the NIFFF2016, I asked how the movie was received when released in Italy. He first replied that it was hard to find funding for it in the current context in which Italy produces almost exclusively comedies and movies for TV. But upon release it was a huge success both public (5 million spectators) and critic (it won 7 David awards - the Italian Oscars - out of 16 nominations). It was even re-released after this avalanche of awards. Gabriele Mainetti is currently working on a different project, but he is thinking about a sequel to Lo chiamavano Jeeg Robot. I can only recommend to go watch this down-to-earth European Super-hero movie, a sub-genre I thought existed only in Comic books (read La Brigade Chimérique) until recently (see the French Vincent n'a pas d'écailles for example).
Rating: 7 /10