3 Films that prolong our summer (aesthetically)
Cinematography. A certain category in film-making comes to perfection in the following films. Be it in La Piscine (The Swimming Pool) or in La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty). A feast for the eyes and an imaginary dose of vitamin D that shines through the screen and transports us in spirit to southern climes. Love, betrayal, aging, and even murder are the Shakespearean motifs that made their way into memory and turned these films into (young) classics.
The fantasy of eternal summer and beauty floats in these films. Fashion is not neglected either. To this day, The Talented Mr. Ripley with Jude Law and Matt Damon is one of the most cited films for classic menswear and a perfect example of the currently trendy Academia Aesthetic. The Wardrobe Department (Ann Roth and Gary Jones) even received an Oscar nomination.
1. La Grande Bellezza
(The Great Beauty)
Writer and author Jep Gambardella hasn't written a novel in years. Instead, he hangs out in high society, which he has dominated for 40 years as a flâneur. He knows everyone and anyone. But seeing and being seen no longer holds the fulfillment he seeks. Loneliness, aging, and the longing for youthful days are omnipresent.
Summertime Rome serves as the backdrop. With beautiful cinematographic shots, we feel the historical breath of the eternal city. The film is a declaration of love to the city, which has been on the stage for many generations thousands of years, and which holds up its own transience to the protagonists like a mirror. What is the meaning of life? What fulfills us? Questions of universal character find their echo here.
Jep Gambardella is not alone. His circle of friends has similar thoughts, but each suffers alone. Life, which can alternate between beautiful and sad moments in a matter of seconds, makes its way here.
But what sounds depreciating is a masterfully told, humorous production by award-winning director Paolo Sorrentino (responsible, among other things, for The Young Pope series with Jude Law), who wanted to capture, in his words, "Italian decadence." And with success: La Grande Bellezza won prizes in the Best Foreign Film categories at the 2014 Oscars and Golden Globes, among others, and was in the running for the Palm d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.
La Grande Bellezza is available to stream on Amazon Prime on the
Arthouse CNMA Channel.
2. La Piscine
(The Swimming Pool)
One of the great love stories, the one between Alain Delon and Romy Schneider, was only continued here as a pair of lovers on the big screen, but "La Piscine" ("The Swimming Pool") from 1969 is still one of the great summer films that you have to see. Here the sun of the south of France glows. The film was shot in the beautiful Villa L'Oumède in the vineyards of Ramatuelle, which Romy Schneider later lived in herself. Many stories are entwined around the film shoot. The fact that Alain Delon had asked Romy Schneider to be cast in the film is one of them. The filming eventually became one of Delon's fondest memories, as he later recounted in an interview. However, there was no more attraction. The romance is only played.
Also in the film: actress, singer, and style icon Jane Birkin, who can be seen here in only her third film and is trés chic.
"La Piscine" is about a couple's summer vacation that is "crashed" by a friend. What begins harmlessly turns into an erotic game that eventually ends in murder. And everything revolves, how could it be otherwise, around a swimming pool, which seems all the more alluring in the searing heat of the Côte d'Azur, making it a silent actor to keep in mind.
3. The Talented Mr. Ripley
From Amalfi to Rome. Against this dreamlike backdrop (before it was discovered by influencers and the rest of the Instagram world), feelings develop here that shouldn't be there. Gwyneth Paltrow, Matt Damon, and Jude Law in the finest threads - menswear as eye candy, so to speak. This summer film thus joins the ranks of other classics, such as "The Great Gatsby" (with Robert Redford, of course!), "Goldfinger" with Sean Connery as James Bond, or "How to catch a Thief" with Cary Grant.
The gripping thriller "The Talented Mr. Ripley" is an audiovisual journey into the eternal summer with the involvement of Italian actors. It is not possible to jump on a Vespa, but you will be infected with the travel bug. The famous The City on the Cliffs, Positano, and various villages on the islands of Ischia and Procida near Naples were used to depict the fictional town of Mongibello.
