Movie Alert: Don't Miss Don't Move

Here's the hopeful Hollywood hook for Don't Move, which opened last Friday, March 11, in a few arthouse theaters here: in the movie, Penelope Cruz is beautiful and gives the best performance of her career--despite being made up haggard, despite having been raped by the lead, despite not speaking in English.

Of course, there's more to the movie, originally titled Non Ti Muovere, than that. In Italy, the movie had legs: last year it was the highest-grossing Italian film in the country, trailing only a few American pics. Its director and lead is Sergio Castellitto, who won the David di Donatello Award, Italy's "Oscar," for the role. (Cruz also won.) Best of all, the movie is based on a book by Castellitto's wife, Margaret Mazzantini, an actress and novelist. Published by Mondadori, the book won Italy's prestigious Premio Strega prize and sold more than a million copies in Italy.

Nan A. Talese/Doubleday published Don't Move in hardcover here last May, to the fate typical of much translated fiction: decent reviews and tepid sales. Concerning the story about a man who at his comatose daughter's bedside recalls his life, particularly his tortured affair with the character played by Cruz, PW wrote: "Timoteo's honesty offsets the turgid writing in this enjoyable if somewhat awkward novel, as he traces the trajectory of the sordid relationship that still haunts him, from the 'viscid pleasure' in its illicit sex to its predictable aftermath."

Now playing in New York and Los Angeles, the film opens in the next few weeks in Boston, San Francisco, Chicago and Washington, D.C. Whether Don't Move moves up the charts and opens elsewhere is anyone's guess. For the time being, Doubleday is trying to tie in with publicity for the film and reintroduce the book to critics and papers. Some coverage, including an item in Wednesday's New York Times, has helped boost the title to the 1,000 range on Amazon.com in the past few days.

Anchor's paperback edition comes July 12. Russell Perrault said that depending on how the movie does, the "very charming" author might come to New York to do media and an event at the Italian Cultural Institute. Whether or not the paperback will have a tie-in cover is also "up in the air"; Anchor may just sticker the book.

Perrault called the timing "odd," noting that the last time a movie beat the paperback of the book it was based on may have been with Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.