Light of My Eyes

Loneliness, Alienation, Desire and Need: A Quasi Romance
LIGHT OF MY EYES ('Luce dei miei occhi') is more a fantasia on theme of loneliness and need for love than it is a straightforward narrative story. Under the direction of Giuseppe Piccioni, who co-wrote the screenplay with Umberto Contarello, it shimmers like and extended poem, a theme so delicate and so suffused with melancholy that it remains as an echo long after the film is over.

Antonio (Luigi Lo Cascio) is a sweet dreamer who respects his station in life as a chauffeur for customers about Rome, following the rule of 'Know when to talk and when to shut up' his boss has set as the standard. In his lonely ennui Antonio narrates his life in a voice-over monologue as a man named Morgan, a character with whom he identifies from his science fiction novel. His life takes on some meaning when he prevents an accident from happening with a young girl Lisa (Barbara Valente) who lives a lonely life with her lonely mother Maria (Sandra Ceccarelli) whose life is divided among...
Almost a love story
Luigi Lo Cascio and Sandra Ceccarelli won best actor and actress awards at the Venice Film Festival for their roles in this unusual story about two urban souls who find each other and then don't fall in love as conventional movie stories lead us to expect. What develops instead is a kind of friendship, as he patiently insinuates himself into her life and the life of her young daughter, then the life of a shady benefactor, with seemingly no ulterior motives than to connect to other people and ward off his loneliness. His only friends are the fellow drivers and his boss at an elite chauffeur service. She, on the other hand, is struggling to operate a frozen food store while attempting to maintain the good will of children's services social workers who are monitoring her worthiness as a mother.

His loneliness and isolation are characterized by the fictional hero of an earthling in a science fiction novel he is reading, who wanders the universe and puzzles over how beings might...
Emotionally Alienated
Director Giuseppe Piccioni directed "Light of My Eyes." He followed this with "The Life I Want" in 2004. This film follows three main characters. Antonio is played by Luigi LoCascio. Antonio is a chauffeur who looks on others much as the alien invaders in the pulp fiction novels he reads, people landing as if from another planet with little relation to himself. Barbara Valente plays the daughter Lisa. Valente has some nice reactions, but mostly is a cardboard teenager whose world we never really enter. This was the only film credit I could find for her. Her mother Maria is played by Sandra Ceccarelli, a self-absorbed woman who obsesses over an apparent affair with a married man who is unable to give her emotional satisfaction. She frets endlessly over the telephone, ignoring birthday parties and having social services intervene to relocate her daughter with the grandparents. Early in their relationship, Antonio stays over and makes love to Maria. From there, the film cools...
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