Every once in awhile a film grabs you viscerally, shakes you, has you on the remotest edge of your seat nearly at the jump.

First-time Italian director, Giuseppe Captondi, knows what he’s doing craftsmanship-wise in the sparkling Double Hour. He mixes robust character
development with Hitchcockian suspense elements and not a little horror genre sprinklings. He also uses a device (spoiler alert!), which will leave you either further impressed, or, er, cheated. I’ll allude to it rather than reveal it since we’re basically talking The Sixth Sense or The Crying Game level of surprise conceit here. And while the film’s first-half works nearly flawlessly and it’s second-half kicks interpretative complexities up a notch, I thought the pull-the-wool-over-your-eyes “stunt” anything but a laborious trick.

The Double Hour has an exceptional depth–of perception, of psychology, of thrilling suspense–only rarely achieved by filmmakers who’ve been doing this a lot longer tha Captondi. That it does so cinematically wiith an economy of traditional exposition, is a further feather in its cap.

Plotwise, suffice it to say, this is about an intriguing immigrant chambermaid (Ksenia Rappoport) and a charismatic security guard and former cop (Filippo Timi), who meet in a speed dating event. Anymore plot you’re better off not knowing. Both actors won Best of Venice Film Festival Awards. Their performances are splendid. There will only be justice when a film like this can make a dent in American mulitplexes … Oh, wait: There’s the inevitable, likely-to-be-lame Americanized version awaiting production. Skip this film for that and you’re a sap.

9 suspenses out of 10

Every once in awhile a film grabs you viscerally, shakes you, has you on the remotest edge of your seat nearly at the jump.

First-time Italian director, Giuseppe Captondi, knows what he’s doing craftsmanship-wise in the sparkling Double Hour. He mixes robust character
development with Hitchcockian suspense elements and not a little horror genre sprinklings. He also uses a device (spoiler alert!), which will leave you either further impressed, or, er, cheated. I’ll allude to it rather than reveal it since we’re basically talking The Sixth Sense or The Crying Game level of surprise conceit here. And while the film’s first-half works nearly flawlessly and it’s second-half kicks interpretative complexities up a notch, I thought the pull-the-wool-over-your-eyes “stunt” anything but a laborious trick.

The Double Hour has an exceptional depth–of perception, of psychology, of thrilling suspense–only rarely achieved by filmmakers who’ve been doing this a lot longer tha Captondi. That it does so cinematically wiith an economy of traditional exposition, is a further feather in its cap.

Plotwise, suffice it to say, this is about an intriguing immigrant chambermaid (Ksenia Rappoport) and a charismatic security guard and former cop (Filippo Timi), who meet in a speed dating event. Anymore plot you’re better off not knowing. Both actors won Best of Venice Film Festival Awards. Their performances are splendid. There will only be justice when a film like this can make a dent in American mulitplexes … Oh, wait: There’s the inevitable, likely-to-be-lame Americanized version awaiting production. Skip this film for that and you’re a sap.

9 suspenses out of 10