Ostende

The first hour of Citarella’s debut feature impresses with its mysterious ambiguity. A young woman, winner of a quiz offering a low-season break in the titular coastal resort, checks into the hotel and awaits her boyfriend’s arrival; in the meantime she’s chatted up by a waiter and observes the other guests. By the time her filmmaker lover turns up, she’s convinced herself something is amiss… An initially intriguing tale of point of view and the power of the imagination, reminiscent at times of ‘Rear Window’ and ‘Blow Up’, becomes increasingly explicit and contrived in the last act, and suffers accordingly. That said, there’s certainly promise here.