Toni Servillo stars in Sorrentino’s second feature, now as a mysterious, insomniac loner whose dark past has left him stranded in a lakeside Swiss hotel. Trapped in a numbed, luxurious amber, he maintains a rigorous daily routine seemingly void of pleasure while wryly observing others and waiting for something ominous and unnamed that he knows will soon upturn his world. Although he attempts to retain a cool detachment, Servillo’s man without qualities is gradually pulled into the spell of a bewitchingly young bartender who inspires an obsessional, unrequited love that tempts him to divulge his hidden identity. Sorrentino’s virtuosic storytelling talents are revealed in The Consequences of Love as it slyly transforms from existential meditation into fast-paced thriller, animated all the while by a precision framing and pace that expressively uses the space of the hotel, at times in almost Tati fashion, to diagnose the absurdity of Servillo’s condition.