This Italian sad-dad melodrama is a global (or at least a midlevel European art film) phenomenon.

The wanton slaughter of mothers and the consequent struggles of grieving single dads has been an epidemic in Hollywood for a long time, and not only in movies starring John Cusack. "Quiet Chaos" a new film from the Italian director Antonello Grimaldi, demonstrates that the sad-dad melodrama is a global (or at least a midlevel European art film) phenomenon. If the film is less maudlin and more psychologically astringent than most American specimens, this is partly a matter of Mr. Grimaldi?s restraint and partly thanks to Nanni Moretti?s sharp and unpredictable turn as the dad in question.
 

Mr. Moretti, who wrote the screenplay for ?Quiet Chaos? with Laura Paolucci and Francesco Piccolo, is essentially a comic actor, but he is no stranger to bereavement as a subject. In "The Son's Room " which he directed (and which won the top prize in Cannes in 2001), he played a father sent reeling by the sudden death of a child. Here, as Pietro, a top executive in a multinational media company, he does not so much reel as blink, stumble and brood. He also has lunch and, since this is a midlevel European art film, some rough sex with a beautiful woman (Isabella Ferrari).
 

The film begins with a brutal, jolting coincidence. At the beach near their summer villa Pietro and his brother, Carlo (Alessandro Gassman) rescue two women from drowning, an event that is nearly simultaneous with an unspecified accident (it seems to involve cantaloupe) that kills Pietro's wife, Lara. He is left with their 10-year-old daughter, Claudia (Blu Yoshimi), and a welter of confused emotions and reactions.
 

At the office things are heating up as Pietro and his colleagues (including the wonderful French actors Charles Berling and Hippolyte Girardot) debate a possible merger with another company, but Pietro abandons work, spending his days loafing in a small park near Claudia's school. As the days stretch into weeks, he becomes something of a neighborhood character, a benign, eccentric presence whose watchful, diffident manner arouses sympathy and mild curiosity from other habitués of the area. 
 

At its best "Quiet Chaos" lives up to its name, enmeshing its protagonist in a complicated, lived-in reality that obstructs his attempts to clear his head and organize his feelings. He passes the time by making mental lists ? airlines he's flown, houses he's lived in ? but other people keep interrupting him. 
 

His wife's sister, Marta (Valeria Golino), shows up with her own minor melodramas and with some interesting background about Pietro's marriage. Guys from work seek him out with business updates, and he handles everything with a distracted air that hovers between worry and amusement. 
 

Thankfully, Mr. Grimaldi and the screenwriters have no great lessons to impart or messages to deliver, and the film, while uneven ? sometimes too on the nose, sometimes anecdotal and diffuse ? is generally absorbing, thanks mostly to the quality of the acting. There is one climactic moment that is both jarring and wonderful in ways that have nothing to do with the story; it's a surprise twist of casting, not of plot. I don't want to spoil anything, but let's just say that ?Quiet Chaos,? in addition to its other, rather modest virtues, earns a special place in the movie-trivia pantheon, midlevel European art-film division, since it is perhaps the only film in which two consecutive winners of the Palme d'Or appear on screen together. 
 

QUIET CHAOS
 

Opens on Friday in Manhattan. 
 

Directed by Antonello Grimaldi; written by Nanni Moretti, Laura Paolucci and Francesco Piccolo; director of photography, Alessandro Pesci; edited by Angelo Nicolini; music by Paolo Buonvino; production designer, Giada Calabria; produced by Domenico Procacci; released by IFC Films. At the IFC Center, 323 Avenue of the Americas, at Third Street, Greenwich Village. In Italian and French, with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 48 minutes. This film is not rated. 
 

WITH: Nanni Moretti (Pietro Paladini), Valeria Golino (Marta), Isabella Ferrari (Eleonora Simoncini), Alessandro Gassman (Carlo), Blu Yoshimi (Claudia), Hippolyte Girardot (Jean Claude), Charles Berling (Boesson) and Ester Cavallari (Lara). 

http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/06/26/movies/26quiet.html?ref=movies&pagewanted=print
 
 

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