Sweet Deceptions

Alberto Lattuada, who co-directed Fellini’s debut, Variety Lights, made this perceptive drama that defies coming-of-age clichés. Seventeen-year-old Francesca (Il Sorpasso’s Catherine Spaak) wakes up one morning nursing a crush on family friend Enrico (Christian Marquand), a much older architect. She cuts school and spends the day observing lovers, contemplating whether to act on her feelings, which ultimately lead her to the hillside town where Enrico is restoring a villa. A tender portrait of burgeoning adulthood, not about sexual improprieties but about self-discovery. Spaak’s sensitive performance is matched by a supporting cast that breathes life into each character, however fleetingly illustrated.