“Math is the language to read the universe, it’s all about relations,” Frank (Samuele Teneggi) tells Nina (Ludovica Nasti) during one of their first lessons in “The Story of Frank and Nina” when the latter hopes the former can help her get the education she was deprived of after getting married to a loathsome brute named Duce (Marco Bonadei) and having a daughter with him. Things add up differently in Paola Randi’s whimsical romantic drama, as exemplified by how Frank speaks of numbers as if they were figures in a play rather than on graph paper and the two form an equation that only makes sense when you arrive at the final result.
Either you’ll be enchanted by the Jean-Pierre Jeunet-esque novelty or quickly allergic to it, but Randi delivers on its full potential as the main couple comes together as an ideal fit, with Nina’s hardscrabble life as a Romani in Italy able to draw Frank’s head out of the clouds when a proper education has led him to want to live according to the great philosophers he’s read. Neither of them are the authors of their own story, however, either in how things unfold or in Randi’s view when she assigns that responsibility to Carlo (Gabriele Monti), the friend that brings the two together in the first place and has a neurological condition that prevents him from speaking. Yet through the magic of the movies, he’s an omniscient narrator who would be considered a motormouth if his thoughts could be heard out loud by anyone besides the audience.
The character becomes one diversionary tactic in a film full of it when starting out with dazzling black-and-white heist sequence that Carlo clarifies after isn’t the story you’ll be following, though Randi wends back to it. Impressively, the relationship drama to come is treated just as dynamically, with the heist is set in motion by Frank attempting to bail himself and Nina out of a jam when Duce stumbles into one of their lessons and Frank improvises a get rich quick scheme involving copper wire. Frank can be counted on to take a greater risk to avoid the one immediately in front of him and it becomes clear which character Randi would identify with the most when they share a big imagination. But although Frank can get carried away, the writer/director keeps things grounded just enough in following the three friends’ flights of fancy in the film while noting how they could all use a little bit of each other’s perspective.
When Randi swings for the fences, “The Story of Frank and Nina” is bound to occasionally hit the occasional snag – the mix of black-and-white and color to reflect the emotional experience of the characters can become a bit murky as an idea for as good as it looks as a visual effect and after circling back to the heist, the film can occasionally seem like it’s buying time before a big finale as the friends’ extended families are brought into the mix. However, it is never dull and for as zesty and zippy as it is, the constant distractions serve a point when the film effectively peels back all the superficial differences the characters may have to see where bonds are built and Randi transcends basic arithmetic to have it all add up.
“The Story of Frank and Nina” does not yet have U.S. distribution.