Product: Under the Tuscan Sun (2003)
Rating: 5.0
"They built the tracks before there was a train that could make the trip..."
I have this movie on my short list of fairy tale / fable / suspension of disbelief movies, along with other "some people love it / some people hate it" films likeSerendipity,About Schmidt,Something's Gotta Give,Sideways (Widescreen Edition), andLocal Hero.These films all have one thing in common: the protagonists find themselves in situations where life hasn't turned out the way they planned, or a major "life event" takes something away from them, and in their own moment of lack and the inevitable pull toward self-pity, they find that the less they focus on what they lack and more on the blessings they have (usually in the form of other people in their lives), the more the their needs are met...and often on a grander scale than they'd previously imagined.In short, some times you lay down and get up to find yourself covered with ladybugs. People who have seen the film will get that reference immediately.There are a number of reasons to watch the movie, beginning with Diane Lane. She manages to bring the viewer right up to the point where they might be turned off by the whining and self-pity, and theby stop "rooting for" her...but she never crosses that line. She keeps her character human, and part of being human is feeling loss and disappointment. What separates the people who stay in that frame of mind from the ones who eventually prosper is a willingness to get up and keep moving, even when "life hurts" and you'd rather not.That's what the movie is all about. In the beginning, following her divorce, her friend Patti (the amazing Sandra Oh) tries to convince her to take a trip to Tuscany. She decides she can't, and relocates the pity party to a cramped, noisy apartment. Fortunately, she lacks a tolerance for her new environment and it's off to Tuscany we go.From that point on, there are too many spoilers, so I'll stop here. My feeling is that there are probably more people who have seen the movie and are reading the reviews to see what others think than there are people deciding if they want to watch it.In the modern, cynical world, there is a certain amount of scorn directed toward these little "fables" and "life lessons." However, taking a moment to watch them reminds us that we are all human, we are all fragile, and we all can make a simple decision to do the best we can with what we have, and to always give thanks for what we've got.