'Vitus': A prodigy for real

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Finally — a family film that really does have something for everyone.

"Vitus" is a heartwarming drama with enough charm to delight the kiddies and enough depth to satisfy their parents.

It's too bad that the film, Switzerland's entry in last year's Oscars, is foreign. It might be tough to get children — and even adults — to watch a film with subtitles. But "Vitus" is so much fun that reading will hardly feel like work.

The problems of the prodigy have been explored on film before — as in 1996's "Shine" and 1993's "Searching for Bobby Fischer" — but rarely with such inventiveness. Vitus (pronounced "Veetus" and played at age 6 by Fabrizio Borsani) shows himself a prodigy at many things, but he has a special talent for the piano.

His mother (Julika Jenkins) and father (Urs Jucker) are delighted. The father is a creative type himself, a hardworking inventor, while the mother soon quits her job to focus on her son.

The attention Vitus gets comes with costs. One of the first to go is baby sitter Isabel, who, in a hilarious scene, pretends to be Tina Turner alongside Vitus' piano player after the two get drunk.

By the time he's 12 (played by Teo Gheorghiu), despite his gifts, Vitus can't stop thinking about what he doesn't have — a normal childhood. Bullied at school, he would rather be tinkering in his grandfather's fanciful workshop, figuring out how to fly, than tickling the ivories.

When an accident gives him the opportunity to be a normal kid, though, he finds that being normal isn't all it's cracked up to be. Here, "Vitus" the film and Vitus the boy get really interesting. Unable to be just another 12-year-old — classical music booms from his headphones as he bikes around the neighborhood — Vitus goes to great lengths to hide his secret life, even renting an apartment in which to play the Goldberg Variations. A little insider trading to make some money is no problem for a smart boy like Vitus.

Yes, some of it is a little unlikely. Nevertheless, veteran Swiss director Fredi M. Murer's charming film sweeps us past any minor plot problems. In Vitus, he has created neither a prodigy who boringly accepts his fate nor a mindless rebel who refuses to use his gifts.

Young Teo is a piano prodigy himself and a pretty good actor to boot — the boy is an amazing find. The rest of the cast is accomplished as well, but Bruno Ganz ("Downfall") steals the show from the other adults as Vitus' fun-loving grandfather, who teaches the whole family that life is nothing without love.

***1/2

TITLE: "Vitus"

RATING: PG (Mild thematic elements and language)

CREDITS: Directed by Fredi M. Murer. Written by Peter Luisi, Mr. Murer and Lukas B. Suter in Swiss German with English subtitles.

RUNNING TIME: 123 minutes

WEB SITE: www.sonyclassics. com/vitus

MAXIMUM RATING: FOUR STARS