Vague Visages’ Enea review contains minor spoilers. Pietro Castellitto’s 2023 movie features himself, Sergio Castellitto and Benedetta Porcaroli. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings.

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In many ways, the Italian film Enea mirrors the themes of Stefano Sollima’s 2023 crime drama Adagio, with the city of Rome functioning as the Eye of Providence, a presence that both haunts and inspires the focal protagonists and antiheroes. In Pietro Castellitto’s 2023 movie, the writer-director (who also stars as the title character) explores the mythology of Aeneas, a Trojan warrior who transformed into a Roman hero. Overall, the filmmaker’s star power on screen stands out more than his directorial style, but there’s something special in the way Castellitto links moral decadence with the downfall of young and cocky aristocrats.

Castellitto mythologizes his character’s earthly existence in Enea. As the privileged son of a doctor (Sergio Castellitto as Celeste) and Italian TV host (Chiara Noschese as Marina), the ear bud-wearing protagonist aloofly enjoys a country club lifestyle while running a restaurant called Sushi Sam, often showing up to dinners intoxicated. Enea hangs out with his best friend (Giorgio Quarzo Guarascio as a gay aviator named Valentino), and also works as an influential cocaine dealer after the murder of his boss, Giordano (Adamo Dionisi). Aesthetically, Castellitto combines orange-lit club scenes and timely soundtrack songs with telling lyrics to communicate the essentials of the protagonist’s Roman existence, with the primary conflict being the lead character’s inability to choose between his love interest, Eva (Benedetta Porcaroli), and the glamorous (and perhaps temporary) life of a Roman drug dealer. The writer-director creates a dream-like effect throughout Enea, via flashback scenes, extended montage sequences and static close-up shots, while a homoerotic undertone suggests that the protagonist and Valentino could be more than just good friends. If Castellitto’s conflicted character can just receive a big break, perhaps he and his best pal can avoid a tragic ending, one that they constantly muse about while living in their vacuum world.

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Enea works as a companion piece to Paolo Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty (2013). As a filmmaker, though, Castellitto doesn’t yet have the same polish with his narrative flow, editing and scene execution. Meaning, Enea’s in media res open — in which Valentino muses about hope and solitude with Marina, and how a life of independence is better than a “clannish path” — doesn’t match the visual style of the subsequent sequences, nor does the dialogue have a profound effect, perhaps because the main protagonist essentially sits on the sideline during the opening moments as an observer. In addition, Castellitto doesn’t fully explore the romance between his character and Eva, which makes a crucial moment during the climax less impactful.

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Castellitto, with his obvious acting talent and looks comparable to The Bear’s Jeremy Allen White, seems like he’s on the path to a monster career. As a filmmaker, though, the director’s unorthodox and uneven narrative flow in his second feature disrupts the subtextual messaging while overshadowing the lush visual design of cinematographer Radek Ladczuk. Enea is full of rich character development, yet the protagonists and antiheroes seem like archetypal figures dropped into a real world setting inhabited by naturalistic side players.

Q.V. Hough (@QVHough) is Vague Visages’ founding editor.

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