Kaos Reviews

This five-part film from Italy's Taviani brothers is, like so many multistoried pictures, a beautiful work in some instances, while other moments are less successful. In KAOS the Tavianis have adapted four stories of Luigi Pirandello, then added a fictional epilog in which the author confronts the spirit of his dead mother. "The Other Son" deals with a woman, Margarita Lozano, who is the mother of three boys. Two have emigrated to the US while the third has remained with her. Yet despite his devotion to her, she despises the boy. "Moonstruck" is the unfortunate story of a young wife whose husband goes mad whenever there is a full moon. She seeks the advice of a handsome local man but finds she may be getting more from him than she had planned. In "The Jar," a feudal landlord and a jar collector learn a few lessons in life from a devilishly sly individual, Franco Franchi. "Requiem" pits a group of villagers against a feudal landlord along with some officials who want to take over a plot of land to build a new cemetery. The film comes to a close with "Conversing with Mother." Pirandello (played by Omero Antonutti) quietly chats with the spirit of his late mother, Regina Bianchi. This final piece and the wonderfully comic "The Jar" comprise the best of KAOS' episodes. With little to link the other sequences together, the film has a certain disjointed feeling, though the Tavianis' strong visual style gives this a handsome look throughout.