Lazzaro, a simple peasant lad, lives in a sequestered village of tobacco farmers somewhere in the hill country of central Italy, put upon by the others because of his unprotesting demeanour but nevertheless ceaselessly happy with his lot. The time period is at first difficult to determine, with the villagers' quality of life seemingly stuck in the 18th century although, strangely, they have electricity too, albeit in the form of a few lightbulbs. Then it gradually becomes apparent, through regular visits by their hectoring overseer, that they are in fact stuck, not only in indentured servitude to the owner of the estate, but within the confines of the village too, quite unaware of the world outside. The estate owner's otherwise indolent son befriends Lazzaro and rails against his mother's explotation of the serfs, pretending to have been kidnapped, but this comes to nothing and then circumstances shatter the dam placed between the villagers and the modern world anyway. From then on, nothing is the same again.
Happy as Lazzaro is a decidely odd concoction, unsteadily straddling the tightrope between magical and social realism. This sometimes serves to have one aspect reinforce the other, but they can also equally well get in each other's way as the limits of the fantastical elements are left undefined, or the clearly impassioned social critique is undermined by the underlying sense of unreality, forced whimsy or some rather heavy-handed Catholic allegorical allusions around the theme of the long-suffering martyr. It manages to retain interest through being so singular and leftfield a blend, but the same blend is ultimately its failing, as no clear message gets through the resulting interference.
6/10
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