Cielo

Sciamma takes his audience by the hand, leading us to the brink of paradise while respectfully acknowledging that he has to let each viewer make the final jump on their own terms.

Ultimately the film is further proof that the literary tradition of magical realism too easily turns to kitsch when translated into visual images.

While not lacking flaws, it offers considerable ambition, aesthetic beauty and bittersweet enchantment, with a surprisingly wide viewer appeal. It is at once this writer-director’s sweetest film and by far his most accomplished.

It’s very strange and singular, but also beautiful and entrancing, one of the most philosophical and spiritual films to come along in quite some time to be told from the perspective of a child.