Quiet, kind, funny, and poignant. Only after the movie has been seen, digested, and lived with does one realize they saw something so wonderful.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 28, 2021

Moretti's typical games are there, not with the effusiveness of previous works but still being able to intersperse situations in which memory, past and imagination merge, with no hallways in between.

| Original Score: 7/10 | Jan 9, 2021

Although Mia Madre's peculiar combination of pathos and pratfalls didn't work for me, it can be an interesting film at times. Go in with muted expectations, and you might be surprised.

| Dec 8, 2020

At times incoherent and a bit too emotionally understated, Mia Madre perhaps best appeals to Moretti's avid fans who can appreciate his square sense of hearty familial dilemmas and their bluntly administered messages.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Sep 15, 2020

It's an intimate tragicomedy that subtly balances sadness with humor. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 7/10 | Jun 26, 2020

It all feels fragmented, making certain sequences-like one where Margherita purposely smashes her mom's car after catching her driving-feel baffling or out of place.

| May 30, 2019

This delicate human drama is constantly interrupted by the altogether ordinary and often unfunny satire on making a film.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 6, 2019

Most of the movie plays like a wet-noodle version of 8 1/2, with reality, memory and dream colliding in a way that only Nanni Moretti could make so pedestrian.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Apr 5, 2019

Mia Madre invokes shades of Fellini's 8 1/2 with tale of a creator dealing with an existential crisis and is only amplified by some of the film's many dream sequences.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Nov 1, 2018

Margherita Buy is terrific in the lead, possessing a face one never tires of watching in close up, and Turturro delivers a wickedly funny portrait of an actor who cannot get enough of himself.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 23, 2018

Operating with an impeccable sense of restraint, Moretti has created a work of great sincerity and unshowy insight.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 21, 2017

John Turturro, over the top.

| Original Score: A- | Nov 13, 2017

Moretti's touch is so sure that the movie often seems to be less than it is, but by the time it's over you might be surprised to find how much it has affected you.

| Sep 21, 2017

Mia Madre may not cut fine facets on the gemstone of the theme, but still, it carries itself with integrity.

| Aug 29, 2017

Unfortunately, the film never hits the emotional highs or lows it's aiming for, and the comedy is too sedate to be enough to carry the film: it's more likely to induce silent chuckles than laughs.

| Aug 14, 2017

With the exception of Turturro's scenes, Moretti's movie is disappointingly bland overall.

| Dec 31, 2016

Writer-director Nanni Moretti packs as much humanity as he can into every scene, but at 108 minutes, piling so many crises into such a long and slow-paced film is a lot to ask of an audience.

| Original Score: B | Oct 5, 2016

Buy gives a moving performance, but she's a victim of a director trying to go in too many directions at once.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Sep 29, 2016

I wish the ending had been more graceful and less cliched. But it is progressively more affecting as it goes along. And for Turturro fans (I'm one of them), it's a must.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 29, 2016

Moretti and his actors establish a kind of instant empathy that makes the story all the more affecting.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 22, 2016