150 - Journey to Italy, 1954, Italy/France. Dir. Roberto Rossellini.

Tuesday, May 30, 2017

150 - Journey to Italy, 1954, Italy/France.  Dir. Roberto Rossellini.

Uncle Homer was not a normal person.

So says Alexander.  Alexander Joyce.  To his wife.  Katherine Joyce.

Alex and Katherine are on holiday.  They are going to sell Uncle Homer's villa near Naples.  They are going to see the sites while they are there.

They are as happy as rotting wood.

Here is an exchange they have shortly after checking into the hotel.

Shall we have something to drink?
Yes.  But not here.  Let's go down to the bar.  At least there'll be some other people around.
Why?  Would it be so terribly boring if we were to remain alone?
No, I was thinking of you.  I don't think you are very happy when we're alone.
Are you sure you know when I'm happy?
No, ever since we left on this trip, I'm not so sure.  I realize for the first time that we're like strangers.
That's right.  After eight years of marriage it seems we don't know anything about each other.
At home everything seemed so perfect, but now that we're away and alone . . .
Yes, it's a strange discovery to make.
Now that we're strangers we can start all over again at the beginning.  It might be rather amusing, don't you think?
Let's go down to the bar.

They go down to the bar.

Alex gives his time and attention to another woman.  A woman they have just met in the bar.

And Katherine has to sit there listening to the live band, pretending everything is OK.

She returns to the room.

He sleeps in.

I must say, one sleeps well in this country.
I've never seen you in such good form.  Do you know her well?

They visit Uncle Homer's villa.  The Burtons show them around.

I never knew my Uncle had such good taste.

She brings up Charles Lewington.  And old friend.  He died two years ago.  He was a poet.  He was thin, tall, fair.  He was stationed here in Italy during the war.

Alex pretends not to be jealous.  Of a man who died two years ago.  As he lists Lewington's deficiencies.

The Joyce's end up spending their vacation separately.

She tours Naples.  He goes to the Isle of Capri.

They appear to be rushing headlong to disaster.

Or worse.  A lifetime of unending ennui.

If this all sounds dreary, consider this:

We are watching--and listening to!--George Sanders and Ingrid Bergman.

Two people you enjoy watching and hearing in everything they do.

So at least you can look at her face and listen to his voice as you sink into the doldrums for an hour an a half.

George Sanders had one of the most mellifluous voices in film.  And a stellar career to go with it.  He won the Oscar for his role as Addison DeWitt in All About Eve (1950).

Most fans begin knowing him with his 25th film, Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca (1940).  We have seen him earlier this year in Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent (1940).  He appeared in franchises such as Mr. Moto, The Saint, The Falcon, and The Pink Panther series.  His work in The Pink Panther series was in the 1964 film A Shot in the Dark.  He worked in dramas, Westerns, action, thrillers, horror, and historical epics.  You may have grown up knowing him as the voice of Shere Khan in Walt Disney's The Jungle Book (1967).  He was one of those actors who seemed to play himself in everything he did.  The highly intelligent, sophisticated cynic who seemed to have grown tired life years ago, because it is all so predictable and trivial.

Katherine goes to the Naples Museum.

Rossellini takes us on a tour with her, featuring statues each carved in intricate detail out of a single piece of stone.

And a tour guide who makes silly jokes.

Katherine is impressed.

To think that those men lived thousands of years ago and they are just like the men of today.  It's amazing.

But Alex rains on her parade.

This cycle will repeat itself.

She will go on a tour.  He will not go with her.  He will show no interest.

As you watch this film, you might think of Two for the Road, Stanley Donen's 1967 film starring Albert Finney and Audrey Hepburn as an unhappiliy married couple on vacation.

We expect the film to end badly.

The only thing that could save their marriage in this land of volcanos is some kind of explosive miracle.

That could raise their love from the ashes.