Tenderness

Lorenzo, Renato Carpentieri, an elderly retired lawyer, has just had a heart attack and finds himself adrift in the hospital and at home, where the distance with his two children, Elena and Saverio, is palpable. He has no real connection with them, and the only warmth in his life seems to come from Francesco, Elena’s son from a past in Egypt, whom he remembers with a quiet fondness. Back home, a new domestic chapter begins as Lorenzo meets Michela, his neighbor who moved in with her husband Fabio and their two children to the apartment next to his while he was in hospital. Michela, Micaela Ramazzotti with a soft, inviting presence, encourages him to smile again and gradually becomes a comforting, affectionate presence in his solitary routine.

Lorenzo learns that Fabio, a neurotic engineer, struggles to bond with his own children, mirroring the emotional distance that has long marked his own relationship with Elena and Saverio. This discovery deepens Lorenzo’s sense of shared fragility across generations, and he confides, during a quiet moment with Michela, that when his children were small he loved them deeply, but that love faded as they grew up. Michela suggests that this detachment could be a psychological defense against the pain of watching his children suffer, a theory that unsettles him and unsettles the room itself. He leaves the house that Sunday burdened by this realization, setting the stage for what follows.

That evening, the world shifts with shocking suddenness: Fabio, the neighbor’s husband, has massacred his own children and taken his own life. Michela survives but is hospitalized, gravely damaged, and Lorenzo begins visiting her daily in a bid to offer protection and presence. During this painful period, he encounters Aurora, Fabio’s mother, a woman whose paranoia and strained relationships stretch back to her own youth, and he reconnects with Rossana, his former lover, whose recent breakup appears to have intensified Lorenzo’s own sense of loss and missed chances. The revelations keep piling up: Lorenzo is not Michela’s father, a truth that brings him a restraining order and exposes a past where, as a practicing lawyer, he had won many cases while at times aiding false invalids or schemes in service of the state. The calamity of Michela’s death follows, forcing Lorenzo to reckon with the consequences of his life choices, and his daughter Elena—who had long worried about him—begins to feel the weight of unresolved pain and the real risk of losing him.

As the days pass, Lorenzo’s world grows quieter and more unsettled. He goes to court and bears witness to Elena’s work as an interpreter during a trial, a moment that blends professional duty with family ties. When the session ends, Elena steps out of the courthouse, and she finds her father waiting on a bench. They sit together in quiet, and after a long pause he reaches out and shakes her hand, a restrained, hopeful gesture that hints at a fragile possibility of reconciliation and a future where silence might finally bend toward understanding.

Last Updated: October 09, 2025 at 15:52