Steel (Stefano Mordini, 2012): Italy

Reviewed by Emma Karlsson. Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

Anna (Matilde Giannini) and Francesca (Anna Bellezza) are best friends. They spend their summer break in an abandoned apartment by the beach with kittens running around their feet. They spend every waking, and sleeping, hour together. We caught them in a transition phase in their lives; right two young girls grow up from being children who plays to being two young females who long for love and lust. Their relationship is being challenged when Francesca’s love for Anna changes into something other than friendship, and when Anna wants to spend more time with her brother’s friend. Anna’s brother Alessio has his fair share of love drama as he remains in love with his ex Elena. Together they are all bound the climate of the industrial city they live in where most people work at the still mill factory.

The film is shot in southern Italy. To emphasize the naive summer feeling in contrast to the industrial city that plays a big role in the film, the scenes are shot in high key, natural lighting with some scenes being overexposed where the background blends in with the action taking place.

For being a film about two teenage girls and their best-friend-relationship, the film unfortunately focus too much on fetishizing and sexualizing the two young girls when it comes to camera angles and chosen shots. The girls are almost always seen wearing nothing but shorts and bikini tops, and there are way too many male gaze pov-shots for being a film about teenage-girls and the unique powerful friendship that exist between the two main characters. The film has ambition, but it lacks focus. The story line of their friendships being challenged by new, unrecognized lusts is strong enough, but it feels like the director doesn’t acknowledge this. Overall Steel is a cute coming-of-age film that brings up a very sensitive subject that almost all girls growing up faces; when you start choosing love before your friends, and the consequences that follows.