Solidrariol Am I Missing Something?

Glucedee It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

Sameer Callahan It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Tyreece Hulme One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

hou-3 The only good thing to be said about this overripe and vacuous melodrama is that we were spared the full 210 minutes of the original cut. I am astonished by the rave reviews some people give it and can only think 1. They are Swinton fans, and/or 2. They left their critical faculties at home when they went to watch it. Granted, it is full on in its depiction of massive wealth, and that's interesting enough for the first few minutes, but soon the wooden acting, intrusive direction and jarring music deliver the message that Guadagnino has nothing at all of interest to say. Everything about the movie is second hand. It reminds me of The Garden of the Finzi Continis, another vastly overrated rich Italian family extravaganza.

Rich Wright Oh, the beautiousness of True Love! You're a middle aged woman who lives a boring life, with a stoic husband and tedious friends. You're quite well off, but you're not happy. Everyday is an endless procession of parties and dull, dull conversations. I would have sympathy for you, but we, the viewers, have to experience it too. What better way to improve your mood about your shallow existence, than to make sure your misery is shared.Then you meet... HIM. He's a chef. Much younger than you. And a DREAMBOAT. And like most nice guys in the movies, completely devoid of any interesting character quirks at all. Still, having your best years behind you, you fall for him. THE SEX IS GREAT!! You do it inside. You do it outside. Look, the camera is lingering on the close-up of a cricket! A wardrobe! A cloudless sky! It's all so arty! I can just picture the cinematographer and director doing a high-five, while I count the patches of damp on my ceiling.Rarely how I seen such a long film, and not be able to recall almost anything about it after it was over. It was like eavesdropping on the most pretentious bunch of snobs this side of Chelsea, who have Shirley Valentine as their matriarch. Apparently, Tilda Swinton learned Russian and Italian, just for this one role. That's like learning how to disassemble and reassemble a car... so you can clean them for a living. It's just not worth it.The synopsis may refer to it as a 'tragic love story', but I would snip the last two words off there. GREAT DVD front cover, though. That's what made me want to see it in the first place. Boy, do I regret that decision now..... 3/10

dromasca Io sono l'amore starts with an impressionist-like picture of a city in winter, reminding a painting by Renoir. Yet, we'll soon realize that we are not at the end of the 19th century but rather 100 years later. The next scene is a party in a very rich people mansion. A family gathers, three generations get together for the birthday of the founding father of the family. He has a big announcement to make about the family heritage, an announcement everybody waits for many years. The relations between the members of the family start to build up under our eyes during the dinner, the old man is obviously in control. Does this remind Coppola's The Godfather? What follows is however a film about the slow decay of the ruling class, a decay that starts from the degradation of the family fabric which does not allow any longer cohesion in face of the forces of economics and history. We are reminded the universe of another great movie – Visconti's Il gattopardo.All these comparisons may seem extremely ambitious for the work of a director, Luca Guadagnino, who is practically at his second feature film only (and the first one seems to have been an erotic teenage drama). Amazing as it may seem, Io sono l'amore is a very complex and daring enterprise that succeeds to compare honorably with the illustrious antecedents it is inspired from and also has a lot to say on its own. The Recchi family in the center of the story is led by strong men who built a textile empire (with dubious origins in the second world war industry, so the Godfather quote is not completely unjustified) and married beautiful women, not always in their own class of super-riches. One of them is Emma (Tilda Swinton), Russian at origin, married to the heir of the empire, leading the house, coordinating the social ceremonies, managing the house economy, raising the children and dealing with their growth and emotional problems. Is she happy? Can she keep together a family that lives in a different age than the one of the ossified bourgeois clans, with some of the younger people trying to break the walls of the conveniences in order to find their vocation or their ways of loving? When the occasion shows up it will be Emma herself who will let her true feelings overcome the conventions, but the way to personal truth may be paved with tragedy. The story of the family relations is carefully constructed and impeccably acted, but there is one moment when the story risks to fall into soap drama. This moment is overcome by the superb acting of Tilda Swinton. I realize now that I missed somehow how huge an actress she is. In one film she succeeds to be at turns high-class cool and passionate, attractive and ugly, young enough to love and fast-aging, in control and completely broken, and all these in one character around whom the whole movie is spinning. At the end, when tragedy had struck, and she has the courage to speak the truth and break the social conventions, she is told by the husband who was a minute ago swearing love and offering protection 'you are nothing'. It is actually the Recchi's who get nothing but emptiness in their lives, and this is the moment when Emma gains back her life and the chance to start again.There are so many beautiful moments of cinema in this film which make it stand on its own and worth remembering even beyond the story itself. There are some amazing moments of camera work, and some haunting fragments of musical score. There is a lot of good acting, and care to the social and relationship details, every corner of the screen is full with characters who live true lives in a realistic and exact composition. There is beautifully filmed nature and there is a lot of interesting food, actually food plays at some moment an important role in the action of the film, as the mean of communication between the characters (one of them is a very talented chef). Guadagnino's movie continues a tradition in the Italian cinema of using family stories to deal with social and political issues and tells again a story which will be worth telling as long as class differences exist and are challenged by history and by emotions.

paul2001sw-1 The ever-versatile Tilda Swinton stars as a Russian-born Italian in Luca Guadagnino's film 'I am Love', which is beautifully filmed, well-observed and acted with a nice sense of understatement. Yet this tale of a wealthy family suffers somewhat from the basic irrelevance of its drama. Being happy is a challenge for everyone, even for the rich, but a story where the characters are essentially free to choose their own lives can feel slight, and although part of the point here is that the individuals concerned are prisoners of their own privilege, the point is made without any satirical venom - the tears of the servant, crying over the departure of her mistress at the end of the film, are shown without irony. Although there are details to enjoy here, I found it hard to sympathise with any of the characters over any of the others. It's not a bad film, but a social dimension to match its emotional one might have added to its impact.