"Voci nel tempo" is obviously a little-seen film since I am the first person to write a commentary here. And despite the fact that the film met critical acclaim at the Venice Film Festival in 1996.
As in many of director Franco Piavolis films, the cycle of life and nature plays a crucial role: We are brought by the camera in to the small, beautiful world of a little Italian víllage in the Lombardy. Step by step, life stage by life stage, we meet the people who are living there. The generations live side by side and sometimes meet with each other, but there is always one generation in the focus. We see a few older people watching the endearments of the teenagers and the games of the children, which some of them now seem to be blocked from due to the unstoppable forces of age and immobility. Yet, there are also many moments of fulfillment and happiness for all generations in the film.
I have seen the film in Italian and I don't speak that language, but the film works anyway: There are only a few dialouges and they appear rather irrelevant to me: To create a powerful vision, Piavoli mostly works with visuals, with faces, with music, with sound. "Voci nel tempo" not only works on a philosophical level, but also feels like a little relaxing holiday trip to an idyllic version of Italy. It's bittersweet in it's melancholy but also finds beauty in the fact that everything changes and moments of happiness and despair are fleeting.
