by Colin Covert

The annual Italian Film Festival returns for its eighth year this weekend, this time offering a largely comedic series that IFF executive director Peter Schilling promises "to help remedy the miserable winter ... they're all a lot of fun." That certainly describes "The Referee" (⋆⋆⋆, unrated, in subtitled Italian, French and English).

It's a spoofy dance-music-and-laughs romp about a rock bottom Sardinian league team's encounter with a top-level international umpire. Lusciously filmed in black and white, its countless visual gags from slapstick tumbles to a mockery of the Last Supper are twice as funny without color. 

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Source: http://www.startribune.com/