Pfeel sexyThe new movie Prime Video by Michela Andreozzi (director and actress) tries to answer the eternal question «How do you feel sexy?», a question that touches every woman’s mind at least once in her life. The comedy tries to offer not easy solutions but some food for thought.
Think yourself sexy: plot and characters
Madeleine (Diana Del Bufalo) He is thirty years old and works as a ghostwriter for a publishing house that mainly publishes biographies and manuals from influencers and web stars. Although her books are always among the top in the sales rankings, her superiors do not value her. And her salary is so inadequate to force her to share the apartment with Stefanothe bizarre gay roommate (Fabrizio Colica).
The relationships with the Catholic and very devout family leave something to be desired, especially the one with the bigoted mother (Angela Finocchiaro, present in a cameo) who considers her a bit of a loose cannon of the parental group. The love affairs are equally unsatisfactory: the sentimental liaison with the charming and very married boss, played by a less than incisive Raoul Bova, makes her insecure, awkward and unattractive.
The encounter with the funny and tender Leonardo (Alessandro Tiberi) seems more promising. But after eating a sweet containing marijuana, he begins to see the most famous Italian porn star next to him, Valentina Nappi. Valentina, like an irreverent talking cricket, offers her precious advice on feeling beautiful, sensual, enjoying life more, asserting herself with men and in her profession. Will Maddalena really be willing to listen to her?
Diana Dal Bufalo and Valentina Nappi. (Prime Video)
Women’s and feminist issues
As a director, Michela Andreozzi has always favored topics that talk about women and women with gentle humor – Since Nine and a Half Moons (2017) a Good girls (2019) up to Astrological guide for broken hearts (2021) at the center of her stories are protagonists struggling with motherhood, female friendship and solidarity, fear and the desire for independence.
In Think sexy, the focus revolves around self-acceptance, to loving the imperfections of the body, to the laborious construction of a solid self-esteem regardless of the male gaze and the freedom to feel comfortable in your own skin. The intent is appreciable in theory, a little less in practice despite the excellent sources of inspiration.
They can be found, at times, the ironic vision of Nora Ephron and winks at the literary genre Chick Litthat narrative for women that reaches its peak precisely with Bridget Jones’s Diary and who Maddalena resembles in her profession, in her choice of too short skirts, in her predilection for seductive and hardened traitors.
Valentina Nappi, Michela Andreozzi and Diana Dal Bufalo, photocall of “Pensati Sexy”. (Photo by Emanuele Manco)
The real, sensual surprise is Valentina Nappi
The narrative tone of the film is far too light, suspended in a limbo which, while satisfying everyone, satisfies no one. There is never room for contemporary dramas and exhibited neurotics in more structured TV series such as Girls or the effervescent irony of Sex and the city.
Think yourself sexy lacks courage, it doesn’t really dig deep but remains on the surface, making do with a tight, low-cut dress bought in a sex shop as a quick fix to no longer feel inadequate. Even the dialogues and the language artificially transgressive they seem more like expedients than a real reflection of expressive freedom.
Certain, Maddalena played by Diana Del Bufalo still manages to make us move and smile but the real surprise is Valentina Nappi’s performance. The cumbersome professional background does not in the least obscure the verve, irony and self-irony of a hardcore queen lent to a harmless mainstream cinema.
From the presentation of the categories of porn sites in which the woman is paradoxically both an object of pleasure and a subject capable of acting and seducing, up to the entertaining motto «what is beautiful is not beautiful, what turns you on is beautiful», Nappi turns out to be the real driving force of the story. And the most sincere feminist message, much more honest than certain vacuous, hypocritical proclamations.
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