The Big Picture

Parthenope
is a misfire of a film that chronicles the life of its titular character from her birth in 1950 to adulthood.
The story is told through the perspective of the men in her life, focusing on their desires and interactions with her rather than who she is.
The film’s representation of women and the portrayal of a person with a disability are tone-deaf, despite some compelling performances.

It’s reductive to say that male filmmakers can’t make movies with female protagonists. It’s been done to great effect, from Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill films to the countless horror movies with badass final girls. But when you watch a title like Paolo Sorrentino’s Parthenope, it becomes extremely difficult to believe that men are well-equipped to handle female-led tales. The over two-hour movie sets out to follow the life of its titular character, a young woman growing up in the second half of the 20th century in Italy. The result? A contrived demonstration of how women are reduced to how they’re viewed by men. “Male gaze” doesn’t begin to cover how Sorrentino approaches his protagonist and her story. Add to this one of the most tone-deaf and bizarre representations of a person with a disability in cinema and you have yourself a vanity project that only offers one question to the audience when the credits roll: how did this get made?

Parthenope (2025) Parthenope chronicles the life of a woman named after the legendary siren associated with Naples. The film spans from her birth in 1950 to the present day, capturing her passionate love for freedom, her city, and its vibrant characters. Parthenope’s journey reflects the full spectrum of human emotions and relationships, painting a vivid portrait of her enduring connection to Naples.Release Date January 8, 2025 Director Paolo Sorrentino Cast Celeste Dalla Porta , Stefania Sandrelli , Gary Oldman , Silvio Orlando , Luisa Ranieri , Isabella Ferrari , Silvia Degrandi , Lorenzo Gleijeses Runtime 136 Minutes Writers Paolo Sorrentino

What Is ‘Parthenope’ About?
The story begins with the birth of Parthenope in 1950. She’s named not by, you know, the woman who went through agony to bring her into the world, but by her father’s loud and bombastic boss. The movie then jumps to when Parthenope is 18 (now played by Celeste Dalla Porta) and she’s immediately introduced as the most beautiful and sexy thing any other character (including her own brother) has set their eyes on. She moves like an agile cat, swaying her hips and waxing poetic on arbitrary topics as she pulls on endless cigarettes. She’s aware of the power she yields over anyone who comes into her path, specifically her childhood friend/lovelorn admirer, Sandrino (Dario Aita). Oh, but Parthenope isn’t just beautiful, sexy, sensual, and mysterious (but again in a sexy way), she’s also smart!! She attends Naples University to study anthropology and immediately earns the attention of her head professor, Marotta (Silvio Orlando).

The movie then skips to when she is 23 as she embarks on a summer of love and fun in Capri with her brother, Raimondo (Daniele Rienzo), and Sandrino. They have no money or place to stay, but that’s okay because a millionaire in a helicopter wants to bed Parthenope. She meets her favorite writer, John Cheever (Gary Oldman), who is the only character who gets worse dialogue than Parthenope. “Are you aware of the disruption your beauty causes?” he asks her over lunch as the entire restaurant, both men and women, stares at her. “Life is simply unbearable,” he says while staring into the middle distance before falling back on his chair. Oldman is truly operating in his own film here.

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Tragedy strikes Parthenope’s family, and the titular character is never the same again. Now, she’s the ultimate combo — sexy and sad! She takes a break from her anthropology career to try to make it as an actress, and it doesn’t even matter if she can act, because, as the movie gratefully forces down our throats in every scene, she is so damn hot! But the plastic and hollow world of entertainment is just too meaningless for our soulful Parthenope and she returns to her studies. But not before she (and the audience) have to watch a live show of a couple conceiving a child known as “the Great Fusion!” Parthenope shares a sympathetic glance with the woman who’s just had to have sex in front of a crowd as if acknowledging the exploitation of the situation. But isn’t putting this scene in the film, when it adds absolutely nothing to the experience, exploitation in itself?

‘Parthenope’ Reduces Its Lead Character to How Men View Her
Image Via PiperFilm

Parthenope is a slice-of-life movie that spans decades of one person’s life but ends up just being a string of a string of conversations between Parthenope and men who want to fuck her. But, remember, she’s smart, so it’s not sexist, okay!? It’s simply a film following years of a person’s life. Sound familiar? To compare it to a similar film (in concept) like Forrest Gump, makes Parthenope all the more frustrating. Forrest, a man, gets to meet American Presidents, save countless lives in Vietnam, be a football star, and become a beloved icon across the globe. Sure, he has some tough times, but his life is defined by many glory-bringing achievements. And what does a woman get? A scene of her being fingered by a disgusting Catholic Priest twice her age.

If you have to pinpoint the one, main issue plaguing this film, it would be the same one that arises in countless other films: Women are defined by their relationships with men. Even when the movie is focusing on Parthenope’s career, it’s through conversations with her male professor. Parhtneope is in need of some guidance but also some looking after, as her parents (who are barely seen) blame her for her brother’s suicide. She finds a sense of family in the professor, but this connection doesn’t arise naturally. Their dialogue is so direct and abrupt that it feels as though Sorrentino is forcing us to feel a certain way about these characters instead of allowing us to come to our own conclusions. It makes their relationship feel contrived and unearned when it should be a sense of calm and respite for both Parthenope and the audience amid the chaos and sadness of her life.

The movie’s best scenes are the ones in Capri between the three young souls. Sorrentino fames these sequences so we know the three are the happiest and most free they’ve ever been, but only the audience knows this won’t last forever. The fleetingness of youth is a pervading theme throughout the film, and it’s the only idea that feels somewhat fully formed. Parthenope dances through the club, aware of the many people watching her but in a world completely her own. Here is where we see hints of a real story and complex character worth investing in. But just like their youth, it’s only fleeting.

If you set out to make a slice-of-life story about a woman, it should have something to say about the female experience. Parthenope has barely any conversations or connections with other women. She does pass down the kindness she yearned for herself, another compelling idea, but it’s passed over for… more conversations with men. Again, I’m not saying that male filmmakers can’t make movies about what women go through on a daily basis. However, Sorrentino is less interested in trying to expose the complexities of his protagonist’s life and more in how she is perceived by the other characters. We’re subjected to long, excruciating sequences of a creepy priest staring at her as if we don’t already know that she is the most desirable woman to walk the earth. While Parthenope is in almost every scene, the movie never fully immerses us in her perspective. If anything, she is kept at a distance so we are always looking at her but never understanding her.

Paolo Sorrentino’s ‘Parthenope’ Is an Epic Misfire
Image Via PiperFilm

As if the movie’s mistreatment of women wasn’t enough, just when I thought this film couldn’t be any more offensive, it reached unimaginable heights. We learn that the professor has a son whom he is severely protective of. We hear his giddy laughs and can come to the conclusion that the son may have a disability of sorts. To fully cement his respect and adoration for his students of over a decade, he introduces Parthenope to him. She cries as she calls him beautiful and rubs him as if seeing a creature from another world. To paint disabled people as some sort of alien or creature is a whole other level of bizarre ignorance.

Credit has to be given to lead actress Celeste Dalla Porta who makes a concerted effort to bring Parthenope beyond the facile script. She’s mesmerizing to watch, not just because of her obvious beauty, but because you can see how much she is trying to convey with just her expressions. While we see her constantly trying to maintain a stoic demeanor, that falls apart in her professor’s office as she succumbs to the magnitude of her grief. It’s a mere glimpse into what the actress would be capable of if given a story and character worthy of her talent. Silvio Orlando as her stern but compassionate professor is particularly compelling as he’s genuinely the only person in the entire film unfazed by her beauty, resulting in the one relationship Parthenope has that feels genuinely built on mutual respect.

To completely dismiss Paolo Sorrentino as a filmmaker is a futile effort. Another rare positive of Parthenope is that it shows again that Sorrentino captures the natural world with such affection and magnificent detail. He’s known for making “one for me movies” without the obligatory “one for you.” But take his 2015 movie Youth. It’s certainly not for everyone, but it’s an interesting exploration of people’s anxiety around aging, with the director pulling fantastic performances from an all-star cast with a lot of black comedy and genuine heart to it. Whether it’s because this is Sorrentino’s first time revolving around a female protagonist or not, Parthenope is a giant step back in the director’s career. When female directors are finding it near-impossible to get funding for their work, it makes the existence of movies that treat women like this even more infuriating.

REVIEW Parthenope (2025) Parthenope is a decades-spanning slice-of-life movie that has no interest in diving into the complexities of its protagonist.ProsCeleste Dalla Porta and Silvio Orlando do their best to make their characters compelling despite a lackluster script.Paolo Sorrentino continues to capture the beauty of the world with great detail. ConsThe film reduces Parthenope to her relationships with men, focusing on her looks and how she is perceived.Parthenope features an intensely problematic depiction of a person with a disability.

Parthenope screened at the 2024 Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.