I AM LOVE movie review – CIFF 34
I Am Love (2010)–****
I haven’t seen many films at the 34th Cleveland International Film Festival, but for the quantity-over-quality people attending the fest, I’ll say this: I doubt you’ve seen a better film than I Am Love. Filled with rapturous sensuality and tragic melodrama, this Italian export from maestro Luca Guadagnino is thrilling from title to end credits. That Tilda Swinton, the finest actress working in cinema today, plays the lead here is just the icing on this delicious cake.
Swinton plays Emma, a Russian immigrant who was swept from her homeland to Milan years ago by her now husband Tancredi (Pippo Delbono). Since then, she has assimilated to the Milan lifestyle, and the film opens with her being the dutiful hostess of a birthday dinner for her father-in-law, the great Edoardo Recchi, Sr. (Gabriele Ferzetti). At the end of the dinner, the aging Edoardo Sr. announces that he is finally retiring from the family business, textiles, and that he will leave his legacy in the hands of his son and eldest grandson, Edoardo Jr. (Flavio Parenti).
When the family patriarch dies, Tancredi, much to Edoardo Jr.’s chagrin, decides to modernize the family business, selling the factory and investing the money in real estate. Edoardo, in an attempt to retain his grandfather’s history of good will, decides to invest in a restaurant that will be run by a talented upstart chef, Antonio (Edoardo Gabbriellini).
With everything changing around her (including her daughter’s presumed sexuality), Emma too desires something outside of being a real housewife of Milan. The moment she tastes Antonio’s cooking, she realizes that something may be the chef.
Okay, I can’t hold it in anymore. I am in love with I Am Love. I love the score. I love the editing. I love the acting. I love, love, love the story. It’s more nuanced than Almodóvar, but I couldn’t help thinking of the first time I watched one of his movies as I watched I Am Love. I flashed back to seeing Todd Haynes’ equally tragic melodrama Far From Heaven, too. I’ll try not to hit up the food metaphors too hard in this review, but I Am Love is a feast for film lovers.
The setting is ripe for drama. It’s contemporary Milan. An upper-middle class family seeks a new identity in a world that is changing rapidly and without concern for the morality and ethics of the past. For the men trying to maintain and grow their empire, the film portrays their dealings as shady, even callous, but necessary. For the women, specifically Swinton’s Emma, the new cultural landscape provides an opportunity to want something beyond their structured role of wife and mother. And for anyone who wants to remain in the past? Let’s just say the story doesn’t end well.
The narrative I’ve described is rich and complex, but it’s the pure filmmaking power that makes this Italian melodrama a masterpiece. There are sequences that are tight and elegantly filmed, with not-infrequent nods to Hitchcock. John Adams’ energetic but classic score sets a perfect tone. Plus, there’s Swinton giving a performance of palpable desire (while speaking fluent Italian and Russian) that provides a foundation on which Guadagnino can effortlessly construct a work of classical-yet-modern beauty.
If you love film, do yourself a favor and mark June 18 down in your calendar. That’s when I Am Love opens in the States (limited release of course). I can’t imagine that a better film will be playing in a theater near you when I Am Love is on the schedule.
I Am Love, directed by Luca Guadagnino and starring Tilda Swinton, was screened at the 34th Cleveland International Film Festival. Find out more at www.iamlovemovie.com.
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