A Few Films for Valentine's Day

Red

A young fashion model (Irene Jacob) and a retired judge (Jean-Louis Trinagnant) cross paths more than once in this study of love, fate, and coincidence. The most successful of Kieslowski’s Red/White/Blue trilogy, it’s a satisfying mix of troubled solitude, murky romance, abject bitterness, and unabashed sentimentality (the puppies), all of which has been brought to the screen with considerable élan. (1994)

Queen of Hearts

A young Italian couple uproot themselves from their village to escape family pressures and set up a coffee shop in London. The story is told from their young son’s point of view, and there are one or two supernatural elements in it, but by in large it’s a comedy of Italian family life, full of arrivals and departures, squabbles and reconciliations, personal crises and dramatic reversals of fortune. "Beware the eight of swords." (1989)

A Room with a View

This film, largely set in turn-of-the-century Florence and sporting a stunning cast, is so pleasant and so unabashedly “romantic” that a second viewing may be required to establish how good it really is. (1986)  

Robin and Marion

Richard Lester was in a groove when he made this revisionist version of the Robin Hood tale. Sean Connery plays the hero, Audrey Hepburn is Maid Marion, and they’re both getting old. Robin is just back from the Crusades, and the screenplay abounds in witty remarks to match his sore back and waning energy. Throw in Nicole Williamson, Robert Shaw, and Richard Harris and you’ve got high drama, too. (1976)

Un Coeur en Hiver

In this unusual film, Claude Sautet, a past master of the subtleties of the human heart (Vincent, François, Paul and the Others) explores the inter-relations of a pair of violin-makers and the concert performer (Emmanuelle Béart) who’s in need of their services. The soundtrack of Ravel chamber music compounds the atmosphere of attenuated romanticism and the presence of students, mentors, and agents gives the film a multi-generational resonance. (1993, France)

Casablanca

Everyone knows about Casablanca, but it’s surprising how many people have never actually seen it from start to finish. The core of nostalgic romance is dwarfed by a wide array of character actors and sketchy sub-plots concerning Germans and refugees from Vichy France who pass through North Africa en route to safer places. It’s difficult to tell who’s a crook and who’s not, and there are very few genuine heroes around, yet every scene strikes an uncanny balance between sincerity and cliché—perhaps because no one on the set, including director Michael Curtiz, knew quite what was going on. (1942)

Beseiged

Bernardo Bertolucci, better known for large scale films such as The Conformist and The Last Emperor, here crafts an intimate and sometimes sentimental tale with a time bomb ticking inside it. An eccentric composer (Michael Thewlis) plays a game of cat-and-mouse with his live-in housekeeper (Thandy Newton), whose husband, unbeknownst to him, is rotting in an African jail. Much of the film consists of day-to-day events at his Roman palazzo, including a hilarious piano recital,  though the canvas broadens considerably when he agrees to help his housekeeper secure her husband’s freedom. (1998)

El Amor Brujo

Director Carlos Saura here adapts the ballet of the same name by Manuel de Falla to an idiom closer to genuine flamenco, drawing on the artistry of a large cast of dancers including Antonio Gades and Cristina Hoyos. It’s a tale of family commitments, star-crossed lovers, knife fights, infidelity, prison terms, racy talk around the community well on wash day, and ghosts.

Certified Copy

A French antique dealer (Juliette Binoche) attends a talk by a British author on the subject of authenticity in the art world. He points out that most originals are renderings of something else—a landscape, a face—while a reproduction can be considered an “original” in its own right. When the author arrives the next morning at the woman’s shop to sign a book, authenticity becomes the theme for further conversation. It’s pretty clear he doesn’t like her shop much, and they decide to go for a drive while he signs the books. During the drive the conversation gets more personal as Shimell learns more about Binoche’s sister and her stammering husband. Binoche looks on them as an ideal couple, simple people who have found contentment with one another and their lot in life.

“There’s nothing simple about being simple,” is Shimell’s caustic reply.

That’s the film: Old World ambiance and cultured talk, sullied by the frustrations of being a single mother in a world where men can deliver lines such as, “Ultimately people must live their lives for themselves.” It contains one or two mystifying wrinkles that I’ll leave it to viewers to discover for themselves. (2011)

I Am Love

This lavish Italian production that has been compared to the best works of Lucino Visconti. The comparison is only superficially apt. Visconti’s works are carefully designed and visually rich—even such black-and-white productions as Obsessione and La Terra Trema—but they also tend to be stagy. In I Am Love, we’re given a “fly-on-the-wall” point of perspective on the comings and goings of a wealthy multi-generational Italian family. The lifestyle is opulent and conservative. The family members are well-mannered, considerate, sincere. In an early scene the old man announces he’s retiring from the family’s clothing corporation and names his successor. The choice comes as a surprise to everyone.

The scenes flow one into the next, we’re not sure which threads are the important ones. That’s what makes the film so interesting. It’s as if the director, Luca Guadagnino, wants us to see not only the most dramatic turns of events but also the paintings on the wall, the tile on the floor, the glaze on the shrimp, and the insects buzzing amid the clover. (2009)