Under the Tuscan Sun (2003)

User Rating:

6.7/10   

Director:

Audrey Wells

Writers (WGA):

Frances Mayes (book)
Audrey Wells (screen story)

Release Date:

26 September 2003 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama | Romance

Tagline:

The Only Thing More Surprising Than The Chance She's Taking...Is Where It's Taking Her

Plot:

While on vacation, a just-divorced writer buys a villa in Tuscany on a whim, hoping it will be the start of a change for the better in her life.

Plot Keywords:

Love At First Sight | Tourist | Market | Virgin Mary | Teen Romance

Awards:

Nominated for Golden Globe. Another 4 nominations

US TV Schedule:

Thur. Oct. 16	9:00 PM	LIFE
Fri. Oct. 17	2:00 PM	LIFE

Cast

Diane Lane	...	Frances
Sandra Oh	...	Patti
Lindsay Duncan	...	Katherine
Raoul Bova	...	Marcello
Vincent Riotta	...	Martini
Mario Monicelli	...	Old Man with Flowers
Roberto Nobile	...	Placido
Anita Zagaria	...	Fiorella
Evelina Gori	...	Nona Cardinale
Giulia Steigerwalt	...	Chiara
Pawel Szajda	...	Pawel
Valentine Pelka	...	Jerzy
Sasa Vulicevic	...	Zbignew
Massimo Sarchielli	...	Nino
Claudia Gerini	...	Signora Raguzzi

Also Known As:

Sotto il sole della Toscana (Italy)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for sexual content and language.

Runtime:

113 min

Country:

USA | Italy

Language:

English | Italian | Polish | French | Spanish | German

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Canada:14 (Nova Scotia) | Canada:G (Quebec) | Canada:PG (Alberta/British Columbia/Manitoba/Ontario) | South Korea:15 | New Zealand:M | Argentina:Atp | Australia:M | Brazil:12 | Finland:K-11 | Germany:o.Al. | Italy:T | Philippines:R-13 | Singapore:PG | Spain:7 | Sweden:Btl | UK:12A | USA:PG-13 (certificate #40079)

Filming Locations:

Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze, Florence, Tuscany, Italy

Company:

Blue Gardenia Productions

Trivia:

In the scene when Frances is talking to her divorce lawyer, the camera stays on Frances and we never see the lawyer. The script originally called for a longer scene with coverage of both Frances and the lawyer. Jeffery Tambor, the actor who played the lawyer, was so impressed by Diane Lane's performance that he insisted to Audrey Wells that the scene would have more emotional impact if his character remained unseen. However, the R2 DVD cut of the film shows the scene in its entirety, including camera cuts between Tambor and Lane.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Frances meets Marcello, she is being pursued by a group of men. As she runs around a corner, her boots are visible underneath her dress and they are medium brown or tan. Later on that same day, when Frances and Marcello start making love in the antiques store, her boots are black.

Quotes:

Frances: [in voiceover] Every day I watch for the old man with the flowers, and I wonder, was he born here? Did he love someone here? Did he lose someone here? He doesn't seem as curious about me, but that's all right. These days I'm something of a loner myself.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Fear of Clowns (2004) (V)

Soundtrack:

Saturday Night (Is the Loneliest Night in the Week)

Stolen Beauty, Van Gogh Beauty

The real life situation involves two relatively lowbrow intellectuals who seek pleasure in Tuscany. They have some minor adventures, mostly related to renovations that took place while they were in their real home in California. Since she can write, she writes a book about the experience that reflects her own appreciation of those pleasures. That appreciation is still fresh mainly because she hasn't actually committed to Tuscan life.

So we have a book. It exists as a conduit for referenced visceral pleasures. Such a conduit depends on not having a connected story.

Now we have a movie of the same title. We not only have an imposed story (of a woman's self discovery and resexualization), that story is emphasized by all sorts of parallel threads: the resurrection of the house (even the "opening" of a certain watertap), the exuberant troubled passion of two teenagers, the episodes of an aging local beauty and the birth of a daughter from her spurned gay friend -- even the eventual acknowledgment of our troubled adventurer by the land as denoted by an local deity delivering flowers.

The overlay of Tuscan pleasures is supposed to elevate this project from the ordinary such.

But let's suppose you really believe what is being preached in this movie: to never settle for the mundane, but actively seek the richest path (as measured by lasting pleasure). In that case, there will be other films that you should see, projects that are more beautiful, many indeed. And projects that don't have to hide their innate pleasures behind insipid romance. Also, as a book, "A Trip to the Beach" may suit you better as a commitment to a new food-driven Latin life than "Tuscan."

As an engineered product, this film has something more interesting than the imposed redundant stories. It realizes that -- so far as the film -- it is about a trip to a place that only exists in movies. Or more precisely, the richness comes not from the real place but the fiction imposed on it by its inhabitants. The predominant vehicle for this is Italian film.

So we have the magi-mentor in this story as a character from famous Italian films, nearly as if she stepped out of a Fellini film into this one. We have the tide turn with our heroine when she attends a movie. We have lots of allusions to writing, photographing, and cooking-as-cinema. All the advice about life is from a filmmaker.

And. And we have the sunflowers. Now sunflowers do figure in the book and in the native landscape. But they -- and several references to the "Tuscan light" are here because they reference Van Gogh. There's a direct visual reference as well with a huge Thuja tree, Van Gogh's sunflower exploits were well to the west and in another country. But what matters here is the combination of his visual enthusiasm with his writing about that enthusiasm. He really would have said you can smell the purple.

Think I'm kidding? Look at the primary framing device: not writing, but writing about writing (aka reviewing). She is sent on her journey as the result of a scriptwriter writing lines about her writing about someone's writing. And her journey ends (with Ed) the same way.

Still think I'm off track? Check out 'Guinevere' which has the same sort of thing: world of film directing the 'real' life depicted in the film. And a much better job too.

I will recommend "Italian for Beginners" for people who want a more engaging use of cinematic northern Italy to heal a broken heart. Or "Wings of the Dove" for those who want things more visually. Even "Stealing Beauty," which is the template for this, is richer. Or if you can focus on food instead of landscapes: "Eat Drink Man Woman," "Vatel" or "Big Night."

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.