Cinema needs literary inspiration just as flowers need water. Three of the most notable films at the recent Academy Awards are adaptations of books or short stories: “The Power of the Dog,” “Dune” and “Mr. Yosuke’s Leadership.” The big winner of the French Oscar, “Lost Illusions”, is also based on a novel.
And what about us? “Let There Be Morning,” which picked up the Ophir Prize last fall, is based on a book by Said Kashua – but it’s the exception that testifies to the rule. This is only the third time in the history of the award that the winner is an adaptation of a literary work. It was preceded by “The Mission of the Human Resources Commissioner” according to AB Yehoshua and “St. Clara”, and is also not based on an Israeli book, but a Czech one.
Unlike its counterparts abroad, Israeli cinema does not like to be based on literary works. For budgetary reasons as well, because such adaptations usually require considerable resources; and for artistic reasons. And more than once it is according to their personal story.
In short, if an Israeli writer wants to see his manuscript become a film, it is better for him to look beyond the sea. For example, the American Natalie Portman is the one who adapted Amos Oz’s “A Tale of Love and Darkness”, the German Maria Schroeder is the one who adapted his “Love Life” by Tzruya Shalev, and now the Italian Nanny Morty arrives with his own adaptation of “Three Floors” by Eshkol Nevo.
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Nevo has already established himself as one of the most successful and beloved writers to emerge from Israel in the last two decades, and is now making another impressive achievement. Previous international adaptations of country-made books have generally maintained a fairly low profile.
This is a Premier League project. Nanny Morty, who adapted the Israeli bestseller into an Italian film, is considered one of the most prominent Italian directors of his generation; He himself stars in the film alongside some of the best actors and actresses in boot country, for example Alba Rorwacher; And the result made its world debut as part of the official competition of the Cannes Film Festival, which is of course the glittering stage there is. This coming weekend, on the occasion of Passover and the commercial potential it brings with it, the film is coming up here as well.
I have not read Nevo’s book, so I can not compare it to the adaptation. We will refer to the film itself: it copies the plot of the book from Israel to the Land of the Boot, and follows the fates of several characters living in the same apartment building in Rome. The story is so boring, and the pace so tedious, that the feeling is that “three floors” actually takes place inside a 30-story building, which does not have an elevator – and maybe it just went bad.
The result is spread over two endless hours, during which we meet a mosaic of characters. Morty, for example, plays a cold-blooded man who alienates his son, whose terrible mistake has cost a human life. As an actor and director who guides other actors, and also as a screenwriter, Morty’s style here is reminiscent of heavy and man-made soap operas. If that’s not enough, the result is also remarkably outdated and features scenes we had already hoped we would not have to see in European cinema.
In a particularly awkward moment, one of the young heroines takes off her clothes, falls on the neck of a stranger who could have been her father, and tempts him to have sex with her. Following this, in one of the reviews of the film in the French media the headline was “How do you say ‘okay boomer’ in Italian?”. Indeed, it seems as if they produced “Three Floors” in the 1990s at most.
And speaking of the ’90s, I have a story: Two weeks ago I had the opportunity to watch “Dear Diaries,” Nanny Morty’s 1993 film, which won him the Director’s Award at the Cannes Film Festival and was crowned a groundbreaking gem. In the distance of time, the film is simply unbearable, exposing the Italian filmmaker as a troublesome and arrogant snooze, with a shocking attitude towards women, qualities that he does well to preserve even in “Three Floors.”
In Italian film culture, Morty is considered a controversial figure, which many even hostile to. After watching the double show of “Dear Diaries” and “Three Floors” I find it hard not to identify. True, almost every new film by the filmmaker is screened at the official competition in Cannes, but that does not mean much either: it is simply another one of those European directors who liked the festival directors and settled in it, regardless of the quality of their work.
All this, of course, does not detract from the achievement of Eshkol Nevo. The quality of the film is not related to it and does not depend on it. His book may be as successful as Italy’s campaign in the last Euro. The cinematic adaptation, in any case, is as successful as its campaign to qualify for the upcoming World Cup.