For once, I went to an event with both a Meetup group and my dad. Why he declined to register as my plus-one or participate in the group discussion afterward, I may never know. The important thing for my review is that I had access to multiple relevant opinions, from people I know both well and not so well. And we all had pretty much the same reaction: "What?"
I'd seen a little of Roberto Rossellini's directorial work before. IMDb reports that I'd given an 8 out of 10 to Rome, Open City, but I can't remember a single moment from it. The Flowers of St. Francis has some appeal to the pious, but I'd be very selective in recommending it. I'd sooner rewatch either than JtI, making this an even bigger source of disagreement with the BFI list than in my last review. This time I can hardly fathom their thought processes.
The setup seemed promising enough. The film was made and set in Italy, but nearly all the dialog is in English, what with the main couple, the Joyces, being Brits played by Ingrid Bergman and George Sanders. If you look closely, you'll note that many other actors were dubbed.
Following the death of an uncle, the wealthy Joyces come to Naples in order to sell his villa. This aspect of the plot actually doesn't get much attention; they treat the trip more like a vacation. Or at least Katherine does. Alex acts bored with Italy from his first scene. Having been to Italy, I suspect he's just a terrible tourist. After all, a scene in which he struggles with a language barrier seems to exist only to illustrate his persistent detachment from anything non-British.
About half an hour into the 97-minute film, I finally picked up a sense of the main conflict: The Joyces don't love each other anymore. They find it hard to get along. In truth, we have to wonder what they ever saw in each other. I'm guessing Alex wanted Katherine for her beauty and she wanted him for his money, because money aside, Alex really is Prince Charmless. (Tip: If your spouse accuses you of constant criticism, the best answer is never "Nonsense," even if you believe it is nonsense.)
This conflict eventually leads to talk of divorce, which by modern standards feels overdue. Nevertheless, in the end, they not only reconcile but declare their love for each other. Neither I nor my dad nor anyone in the Meetup group could devise a plausible reason. Did the omnipresent signs of Catholicism remind them that divorce was taboo in their culture? Did Katherine's more macabre moments of tourism, punctuated by the fresh excavation of Pompeii fossils, cause her to dread dying alone so much that she wouldn't even take a chance on another man? Is Italy such a magical place that even a man who hates it finds his heart abruptly changed? Or, as a Meetup viewer suggested, did meddling executives demand a tacked-on happy ending without regard to likelihood?
Whichever, Rossellini really fell down on the job of conveying the answer. Maybe you like subtlety in your art, but cinema has never been a very good medium for subtlety. If you want to get a message across, then don't be afraid to make it obvious; otherwise it gets lost on many viewers.
In fact, ultimately, I think all the film's flaws boil down to communication issues. Some of us found the dialog unconvincing. Some who had been to Italy remarked that Italians don't normally talk at nearly shouting volume. Bergman, not for the last time, does not have accents among her acting strengths. Perhaps most grievously, the music swells during some of the tours as if we were about to get a big revelation, but it never comes -- not that we noticed, anyway.
My dad was glad to have come, but if it weren't for the 1950s look at Italy, he'd have been bored. That's a more generous assessment than mine. Might I recommend Roman Holiday for '50s Italy and JtI for a textbook example of a polarizing "classic."
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