Dir: Tommaso Landucci | Drama Italy 2026
Tommaso Landucci’s fiction debut, ‘Children of the Monkey’ (I figli della scimmia), arrives in Venice’s Orizzonti sidebar carrying the heavy weight of expectations. Luckily it completely delivers. The film is a moving, masterfully calibrated family drama. It features a career-best performance from Riccardo Scamarcio.
Scamarcio plays Dario. He is a father suffocating under the quiet, exhausting routine of caring for his son. His son lives with severe cerebral palsy. Landucci avoids standard melodrama. He focuses instead on the uncomfortable, unspoken cracks in domestic life.
The tension breaks when Dario’s teenage nephew arrives. Dario forms a sharp, easy bond with the nephew. It is a connection he cannot forge with his own child. This bond triggers a devastating psychological shift.
The script won the Solinas Award. Every scene shows why. Unfolding slowly it spends time developing the characters and tackles the taboo of parental resentment with fierce intelligence.
Scamarcio plays against his usual charm. He uses a raw, coiled vulnerability. While not an easy watch this is a triumph for Italian cinema, and in a similar vein to Il Stanza del Figlio it’s a memorable drama in this year’s Venice Orizzonti lineup.
VENICE FILM Festival