‘Tarantella’ Handles Ethnic Ties That Bind

Helen De Michiel’s “Tarantella” is awkward and too often self-conscious, but its heart is in the right place as it explores the lives of Italian American women.

The film gets a big boost through the presence of its star, Mira Sorvino, who was nominated for an Oscar for playing an adorable hooker in Woody Allen’s “Mighty Aphrodite.” Sorvino’s career is taking off so swiftly it would be hard for her now to commit to such a chancy project. Although Sorvino’s consistently better than the movie, De Michiel and co-writer Richard Hoblock have provided her with a fine, sensitive, far-ranging role.

Sorvino plays Diana, an ambitious young photographer whose life is turned upside down when her widowed mother, to whom she was not close, dies unexpectedly.

It’s clear that Diana had found her upbringing in a blue-collar Italian American neighborhood, apparently in New Jersey, so oppressive that she had rejected her heritage outright. But as an only child it falls to her to dispose of her mother’s home and possessions. Clearly, the task is going to be painful, yet it proves not to be as cut and dried as she had thought.

That’s mainly because her mother’s best friend and longtime neighbor, Pina (Rose Gregorio), takes it upon herself to raise and expand Diana’s consciousness. The two women clash considerably, but friendship and mutual affection blossom as Pina starts translating for Diana her mother’s “Libro di Casa,” a lovingly assembled scrapbook containing not only recipes and mementos but also family history unknown to Diana.

Gradually, Diana begins to appreciate her mother’s and grandmother’s capacity for survival, for the possibility of solidarity between women and the sustenance that can be derived from everyday traditional rituals and from an appreciation of nature. Diana does what many others have: take and draw strength from what’s best from one’s heritage instead of flatly rejecting it.

De Michiel has a sensibility that glows, and she allows Sorvino and Gregorio to show us many facets and shadings of the women they portray so well. For a first-time director, however, De Michiel has attempted too ambitious a mix of styles when she intercuts between the present and Diana’s family history, which unfolds in bits and pieces as a puppet play.

“Tarantella” is not nearly as well crafted or even well thought-out as it ought to be, yet it is affecting emotionally because of De Michiel and her actresses’ clear commitment to what it has to say about women reaching out to each other over time and generations.

* Unrated. Times guidelines: The film includes some blunt language and some nudity.

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‘Tarantella’

Mira Sorvino: Diana Di Sorella

Rose Gregorio: Pina De Nora

Matthew Lillard: Matt

Frank Pellegrino: Lou

A Tara release of an ITS presentation of a LaVoo production. Director Helen De Michiel. Producer George LaVoo. Screenplay Helen De Michiel, Richard Hoblock. Cinematographer Teo Maniaci. Editor Richard Gordon. Costumes Suzanne Schwarzer. Music Norman Noll. Production designer Diane Lederman. Puppetry designer Sandy Spieler. Running time: 1 hour, 27 minutes.

* Exclusively at the Nuart, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West Los Angeles, (310) 478-6379.