This movie has beautiful sets and some excellent actors, but I was never going to be able to connect to it, because the rational characters don't behave like real people would. Real people ask questions. When they stumble upon something curious, they discuss it. And people in an unstable situation don't invite their relatives over to live with them if they're trying to keep it a secret.
When a director makes a movie, they're making a contract with the audience. In a movie like this, the contract includes the behavior of the characters. When the characters don't behave like real people would, then I feel like the director has broken his contract.
Real people don't create an incredibly suspicious situation and then add overly complicated contraptions to cover for it, like the tape recorder, and then invite a relative to stay. Of course the relative is going to become curious until he finds out what's going on. Real people don't lie about extremely obvious things, like the piano playing, if they're really trying to keep someone from being curious. Real people would tell the real situation to the relative and ask if he still would want to stay with them. Of course, each new thing that the guest figured out, he was blabbing it all over the place. What else was to be expected?
Not just that, but there was no explanation why many people did the things they did. For instance, why did Catherine Deneuve show up at the end dressed as she was? Was that the only way to calm the man in the room? Why did she have to calm the man in the room? I didn't feel that anything bad was necessarily imminent. That wasn't clear to me, and there were very many of the same situations in this movie where people were taking actions for no other reason than to try to create suspicion in the audience. This type of suspense always falls flat. Audiences are more sophisticated than that.
Vittorio Gassman is a terrific actor, but sometimes I feel that he tries too hard. In this movie, I didn't see him as the character, I saw him as Vittorio Gassman doing his best to try to act the part. I really appreciate the effort he put into this character and to others he's done, but I feel as if he's always aware of the camera in this movie. In Il Sorpasso, he was completely at ease and allowed the audience to believe that we were watching everything really happen, unseen, from the sidelines.
Catherine Deneuve was the only major character who had any moments that had individual personality. Her sticking her tongue out at the back of the maid seemed really genuine. Movies need more of that kind of thing if they want the audience to accept the scene as real.
This movie is fine if it happens to come on on a lazy afternoon while you're watching TV, but I would not recommend putting it on on purpose.
When a director makes a movie, they're making a contract with the audience. In a movie like this, the contract includes the behavior of the characters. When the characters don't behave like real people would, then I feel like the director has broken his contract.
Real people don't create an incredibly suspicious situation and then add overly complicated contraptions to cover for it, like the tape recorder, and then invite a relative to stay. Of course the relative is going to become curious until he finds out what's going on. Real people don't lie about extremely obvious things, like the piano playing, if they're really trying to keep someone from being curious. Real people would tell the real situation to the relative and ask if he still would want to stay with them. Of course, each new thing that the guest figured out, he was blabbing it all over the place. What else was to be expected?
Not just that, but there was no explanation why many people did the things they did. For instance, why did Catherine Deneuve show up at the end dressed as she was? Was that the only way to calm the man in the room? Why did she have to calm the man in the room? I didn't feel that anything bad was necessarily imminent. That wasn't clear to me, and there were very many of the same situations in this movie where people were taking actions for no other reason than to try to create suspicion in the audience. This type of suspense always falls flat. Audiences are more sophisticated than that.
Vittorio Gassman is a terrific actor, but sometimes I feel that he tries too hard. In this movie, I didn't see him as the character, I saw him as Vittorio Gassman doing his best to try to act the part. I really appreciate the effort he put into this character and to others he's done, but I feel as if he's always aware of the camera in this movie. In Il Sorpasso, he was completely at ease and allowed the audience to believe that we were watching everything really happen, unseen, from the sidelines.
Catherine Deneuve was the only major character who had any moments that had individual personality. Her sticking her tongue out at the back of the maid seemed really genuine. Movies need more of that kind of thing if they want the audience to accept the scene as real.
This movie is fine if it happens to come on on a lazy afternoon while you're watching TV, but I would not recommend putting it on on purpose.