Latin Lover is all looks and no brains

    1 of 2 2 of 2

      Starring Virna Lisi. In Italian and Spanish, with English subtitles. Rating unavailable.

      As an acting exercise in the vein of François Ozon’s Eight Women, Latin Lover certainly shows off its large, largely female cast, led by the late Virna Lisi, in her final screen appearance. But this saving grace belongs to them, not to director Cristina Comencini, whose script (with Giulia Calenda) does little to justify on-screen enthusiasm.

      Ten years after the death of an internationally famous (but fictional) actor called Saverio Crispo, five daughters from five different actresses—plus two of the mothers and various spouses, children, and hangers-on—head to Italy’s southern heel to celebrate his career. Really, they’ve gathered to settle old scores and stir up new animosities, so almost half the film’s dragged-out length is devoted to back stories detailing which daughter goes with whom. (Hell, even the cook’s kid is called Saveria.)

      The most interesting, played by Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, is a product of Saverio’s “French parentheses”. He also had offspring in Spain (with Almodóvar veterans Marisa Paredes and Candela Peña as madre and hija), the U.S., and Sweden. The Spanish daughter’s husband (Jordi Mollà) hits on the Swede (Finland’s pretty Pihla Viitala), who’s somehow powerless to resist. There’s a parade of standard-issue insecurities, with no hint of the talents that supposedly made these women successful, mostly at their father’s trade. But it’s always about some guy, isn’t it?

      When not aping Nino Rota, the film’s quacking musical score keeps reminding us how hilarious everything is. But there’s a much bigger problem. Saverio is supposed to be an unforgettable star along the lines of Vittorio Gassman and Marcello Mastroianni. But the numerous clips with blandly handsome Francesco Scianna, shot in a variety of styles and settings, convey only the thinnest surfaces of Italian moviedom, with nothing of its philosophical depth, let alone the gravity of its acting traditions. These enjoyable faux excerpts suggest that the otherwise style-free director—whose own father was a well-known filmmaker—has at least seen La Dolce Vita and Big Deal on Madonna Street. But did she understand them?

      Comments