#marcello fonte

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“A filmmaker less astute and compassionate than Matteo Garrone might have directed Marcello Fonte to play his title character in Dogman as either schlemiel or schlimazel. As Marcello, a canine groomer, single father, and part-time drug dealer in a gloomy Italian coastal village whose fate becomes entangled with that of a vicious thug, Fonte possesses a robust talent beneath his skeletal frame and furtive demeanor. He has a face that was made to be filmed and studied, distinguished by a pair of sunken eyes that convey a wide range of conflicted emotions throughout Garrone’s grim fable. Marcello’s plight could have merely been the source of cheap, ridiculing gags or holier-than-thou sermonizing, but neither Garrone nor Fonte are interested in using the character as a target for easy satire or moralization. Instead, Garrone permits his game and gifted leading man to play his role with a straightforward realism that gives dignity to a dehumanized individual. Fonte, in turn, enables Marcello’s plummet from complicit, tenderhearted everyman to cold-blooded avenger to assume a clarifying sense of tragedy, one made all the more poignant for occurring to an actual human being and not a stock character.” — Matthew Eng

The 12 Best Male Film Performances of Early 2019

Best Actor 2019

Winner:

Franz Rogowski - Transit

Nominees:

Dogman (2018) dir. Matteo Garrone