Happy As Lazzaro

"A slow but bewitching burn that rewards viewers' patience with humor and uncanny grace, sealing Rohrwacher's status...as a truly distinctive European major."

"I found the film tendentious and sophomoric, and Lazzaro's Forrest Gump imitation inevitably tedious."

"Like early Pasolini, Rohrwacher's films are on the level with their subjects - there's no swank or pretension. They seem to muck in with the communities they're about."

"With Happy as Lazzaro, Rohrwacher has crafted a magic-realist fable that doubles as an origin myth for a modern Italy subsumed by corruption and decline."

"Unravels with a Pinocchio-like logic that comes across as perplexing at first, then proves spellbinding."

"It feels like part two needed another couple of drafts before this was ready to go into production."

"Happy As Lazzaro is s-l-o-w and its narrative twist will alienate some. But this is deliberate, singular filmmaking, at once poetic and down-to-earth, from an unsung talent."