Exploring Passion and Power in '365 Days'
365 Days brings us the intriguing yet rather provocative plot. Massimo is a featured character of the film, a member of a mob family from Sicily who fancies a woman whom he barely gets to know, Laura. Italian sales director Laura is eventually kidnapped by businessman Massimo, who offers her a year to love him. However, they try to portray a ray of hope and the positive emotion-love in a world of chaos which involves dangerous motives and passions.
Nonetheless, the movie deals with concepts such as obsession, change, power relationships between two individuals, and seduction, which are depicted in an erotic way. The show discusses the complications of interactions between individuals with profound needs and personal history in which tragedy loomed large. While keeping close to romance, it also shares the feeling of tension and suspense, with a renewed sense of what love may be.
Both Anna-Maria Sieklucka and Michele Morrone are presenting confident on-screen chemistry while portraying a passionate but disagreeable couple. Laura is shy yet fierce throughout the Sieklucka’s performance, and Morrone brings pure, unadultered desire as Massimo. Although, at times, they are stereotyped, audiences always want to see more of their characters.
Starring Barbara Bialowas and Tomasz Mandes, 365 Days is a movie that Unrushed scenery and beautiful scenes of shots are interruoted by pacing issues which might put a viewer to the test. The directors aim at conveying most of the information visually but while doing that they sacrifice the development of deep feelings for stylization.
The music in 365 Days is well represented in the movie with a sultry soundtrack which underlines the passion and tension in the film. It adds to the continuity of the cast and stresses the ebb and flow of the movie’s emotion.
Michal Sobocinski’s directing of the cinematography draws the sex appeal, beauty, and elaborate setting of the movie into a cohesive stunning symphony. The cinematography complements the luxurious atmosphere described throughout the scenes, and every shot looks like a still life. The beautiful set designs do not simply add to the perception of Massimo’s braggadocios world, but it also drives the fairy-tale like aspects that is at the core of Laura’s change.
Lastly, the special effects employed in the series are far from overwhelming as they do not dilute the primary focus of the show that is the interpersonal relations and profound drama. The practical actions are fully-realized, providing a great deal of very real and fairly visually arresting scenes.
On the visual side, the editing done by Marcin Szocinski can be described as every sleek, but somewhat inconsistent in terms of how it handles the flow of the movie most notably in the transitions between the scenes of heavy melodrama and more contemplative scenes. It disrupts the flow of storytelling and can hinder the sense of the audience’s presence.
This makes it uneven at times and meanders when it comes to building a storyline. Although this moderate pacing allows the audience to fully enjoy the build up for the movie’s action, drama and visuals, it may prove frustrating at times.
With dialogue ranging from poignant to soap opera-esque the film attempts to express a wide range of emotions and the trials and tribulations of the protagonists at their centre. Still, some scenes might be rather weak, containing clichés in dialogues, and weaken the impact of strong emotions which the characters display on screen.
Despite the super-hot passion and the breathtaking cinematography, 365 Days leaves the viewer with the problems in script pacing and the characters’ development. +and risk-taking for presenting participants’ drastic aspects of the passionate temper of a couple; still, it seems to be insufficiently thought through. Depending on the perspective, the film raises strong feelings about love, power and choice as well as causes controversy due to its plot and representation of a dangerous love affair. It is an exploration of passion to extent to which it can provoke and shock, while leaving a mark at the end. Even with the flaws, the film cannot be described as anything other than a daring experiment that fulfills its goal and keeps as well as bends the viewer.
