Based on Zeffirelli's own experiences in Firenze (Florence) at the beginning of and during the Second World War, this film has quite a strong connection with the also recently seen `Up At the Villa' (200) (qv), in as much that British ladies are again central features - when not characters - of the story. It is supposedly from this period that Zeffirelli's love of Shakespeare stems.
Whereas nothing much can be said against any of the fine dames - Mss. Judi Dench, Joan Plowright and Maggie Smith - leading the cast, one did not feel that there playing anything more than tongue-in-cheek bravado aplomb, which Cher's participation only served to accentuate or exaggerate. Such that one felt somewhat at a loss as to the sincerity of the whole operation, especially in the latter stages of the film's development. Most certainly the first half is better and with a more cohesive continuity, but this in the second half begins to break up, even fragment, into rather haphazard disjointed story-telling spread over lengthy periods of time clumsily strung together.
It was certainly nice seeing those fine old actresses again, or even the oft surgically operated Cher, and indeed they afforded several interesting moments; but on the whole neither their efforts nor those of Zeffirelli himself add up to very much. The film left me wondering whether Zeffirelli was unsure as to his film being an all-out comedy or as to it trying to be a more serious drama. In the end it is not really one or the other but almost a pastiche of both without much conviction.
Whereas nothing much can be said against any of the fine dames - Mss. Judi Dench, Joan Plowright and Maggie Smith - leading the cast, one did not feel that there playing anything more than tongue-in-cheek bravado aplomb, which Cher's participation only served to accentuate or exaggerate. Such that one felt somewhat at a loss as to the sincerity of the whole operation, especially in the latter stages of the film's development. Most certainly the first half is better and with a more cohesive continuity, but this in the second half begins to break up, even fragment, into rather haphazard disjointed story-telling spread over lengthy periods of time clumsily strung together.
It was certainly nice seeing those fine old actresses again, or even the oft surgically operated Cher, and indeed they afforded several interesting moments; but on the whole neither their efforts nor those of Zeffirelli himself add up to very much. The film left me wondering whether Zeffirelli was unsure as to his film being an all-out comedy or as to it trying to be a more serious drama. In the end it is not really one or the other but almost a pastiche of both without much conviction.