Room in Rome - DVD

Movie: Spanish Alba (Elena Anaya) and Russian Natasha (Natasha Yarovenko) meet one night in Rome and spend a few passionate hours together in Alba's hotel room. But what should have been just a brief sexual adventure ("We don't talk. We don't need to talk. It's better that way"), turns into an emotional rollercoaster for the two women, confronting them with unexpected feelings, but also with demons of their past...

With "Lucia and the Sex", director Julio Medem has already staged an acclaimed erotic drama that proved that uninhibitedly frank sex scenes and sensitive, very real romance can indeed go hand in hand. Even "Room in Rome", which feels a bit like the lesbian version of the erotic chamber play "En la carma - Im Bett", illustrates the naturalness of physical love without excessive voyeurism and reveals that it is often easier to take off one's clothes than to allow deeper insights into one's soul.

Even though the two leads are seen nude for almost the entire film, the erotic element of their nudity quickly fades into the background. On the contrary, one of the most sensual moments in the film is when Alba and Natasha slowly put on each other's robes. That's not to say that a certain voyeurism isn't catered to, after all, eroticism plays no small role here. But sex and naked bodies are not so much in the foreground that "Room in Rome" could be dismissed as a simple sex movie.

As Natasha and Alba can let themselves go physically more and more and pure lust turns more and more into real passion and maybe even into something like love, so they open up more and more to the other. While at the beginning lies dominate their conversations, the truth takes more and more space the closer the two women get to each other. Medem stages this with his two leading actresses well and above all credibly. What the production can be criticized for, though, is that the film tries a bit too cramped to be artistically valuable at some points. Especially towards the end, when a statement by Natasha Alba literally hits like an arrow to the heart, Medem overdoes it a bit too much with his not exactly subtle symbolism.

If you like dialogue-heavy romances like "Before Sunrise" or the aforementioned "En la carma - In Bed", and if you appreciate aesthetic erotica, you'll also enjoy "Room in Rome". Worth seeing!

Picture + Sound: Although many scenes take place in semi-darkness, there are few weaknesses in overall sharpness, thanks to well-matched contrasts. Good color mixing highlights the aesthetically pleasing camerawork. The audio remains unspectacular and is dominated by the dialogue and quiet soundtrack. On the German soundtrack, the dialogue sounds a bit more front-heavy, but more powerful as a result. Good.

Extras: Unfortunately, there is only the trailer for the film and more film tips as bonus material.

Conclusion: "Room in Rome" is an aesthetically staged erotic drama that focuses less on physical voyeurism and more on soulful striptease. A well-acted, sensual chamber play with occasional lengths and small weaknesses in the staging, but which tarnish the overall picture only marginally. The DVD is technically neatly implemented, but disappoints by the lack of any extras. Recommendable

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp