VIVA LA LIBERTà
Opens on Friday
Directed by Roberto Andò
In Italian, with English subtitles
1 hour 34 minutes; not rated
The prospect of Toni Servillo’s playing not one but two roles in a state-of-the-union comedy could tantalize any admirer of his delectable turns in “The Great Beauty” and “Il Divo.” But with its switcheroo fable of a despondent politician and his unstable identical twin, Roberto Andò's “Viva la Libertà” wobbles between being wispily suggestive of finer existential meaning and generational commentary, and being basically a handsomely dressed-up “Dave” for post-Berlusconi Italy.
In Mr. Andò's adaptation of his own novel, the opposition leader Enrico Oliveri (Mr. Servillo) goes AWOL after an embarrassing speech at a party conference. In a pinch, his chief operative (Valerio Mastandrea) installs Enrico’s brother, Giovanni, a philosophy professor and mental patient.
Everyone buys the impersonation; Giovanni’s eccentric speeches inspire colleagues and crowds alike; and, just like that, 50 percent of the film becomes deeply uninteresting. Away from the action, Enrico seeks refuge with a married ex-girlfriend (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi) and gets involved with a film shoot, but his time off feels diffuse and hastily sketched.
Mr. Servillo’s twin siblings are a bit like the classical masks of tragedy and comedy, Enrico’s jowly glumness next to Giovanni’s Groucho-eyebrowed insouciance. But Mr. Andò flows ineffectually back and forth between the brothers, making elegant use of some Verdi but less so of Mr. Servillo.
This sly actor recognizes the fantasy’s limits by giving Giovanni, a consummate holy fool, a nagging vacuousness. But “Viva la Libertà” amounts to a rather uninspiring satire at this point for a country frustrated by political decrepitude.