2.5 stars (out of 5)
There’s so much in co-writer/director Sydney Sibilia’s tiresomely manic comedy that irritates, but mostly it’s the glaring fact that this irksome effort is so similar in set-up to Breaking Bad (Il Breaking Baddo?), only without the protagonist’s terminal illness. And although BB was frequently disturbing, it was also, when you least expected it, awfully funny too – which Sibilia’s film isn’t.
A wildly gesticulating and ridiculously overeducated molecular researcher named Pietro Zinni (Edoardo Leo) flashes back on how he and his wimpy academic pals became criminals, and for some reason the bizarrely inappropriate Offspring song Why Don’t You Get A Job? plays over the opening credits. Pietro is then shown as desperate for cash as he hangs out for a university promotion, but he’s instead fired and therefore forced to lie to his long-suffering missus Guilia (Valeria Solarino) and chase a student who owes him tuition fees. This pursuit leads him to a nightclub, where the exhausted Pietro samples some quality ecstasy and hits upon the idea of making a semi-legal (nearly) batch using university property and with the help of his similarly underemployed colleagues. Lots of overacting later and they’re professional dealers, renting glamourous apartments, having wild parties with gorgeous models and attracting the interest of the police and a nasty bigtime baddie named Murena (Neri Marcorè), who doesn’t take kindly to all this ridiculous hamming.
Hoping to make points about the GFC amid its wannabe-darkly-hued comedy, this instead manages to deeply annoy due to its improbably silly plot, many plot contrivances, clichéd sexism and convoluted climax. And guys, please: enough with the damn hand-waving!!! Mama mia!!!
I Wake Up Screening 