Paolo Virzì's Human Capital follows a group of interconnected individuals during the events of a particularly joyless Christmastime. Middle-class Dino (Fabrizio Bentivoglio) wants to be a financial high roller, especially since his second wife, Roberta (Valeria Golino), is pregnant with twins. Dino tries to get into business with upper-class Giovanni (Fabrizio Gifuni), a pragmatic hedge fund manager whose bored and neglected wife, Carla (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, given more to do than in Viva La Liberta) intends to renovate a disused theater, and whose douchey son Massimiliano (Guglielmo Pinelli) is dating Dino's (but not Roberta's) teenage daughter Serena (Matilde Gioli), who herself is more interested in a troubled lower-class boy named Luca (Giovanni Anzaldo), who lives on the second floor of the projects. Also, a waiter who served Dino and Giovanni's families at a fancy-pants event is killed later that evening (in the opening scene) when Massimiliano's SUV hits his bicycle, though Massimiliano swears he wasn't driving it. Humans, right? Much of Human Capital is the events leading up to that tragedy replayed from Dino's, Carla's, and then Serena's perspective, teasing out the central mystery of who was driving. Nobody gets away clean, as the saying goes, but having money sure helps, especially if you know how much a human life is worth.
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