She is the wife of a rich industrialist in Milan who met her in Russia... she organizes dinner parties, but retires early, not so into the old family scene... I was disgusted with the trope of the family elder retiring and leaving the business to his son and grandson as a pronouncement that is handed down and obeyed. Boring.
She is a great cook and appreciates food, and when Antonio, her son's chef friend, makes her prawns in his restaurant, she has a spiritual experience, and then she follows him to a town where his farm is, and he runs into her, and he takes her to the farm, and they kiss... then when all the family is out of town, she goes with him to the farm again for some days and they make love and cook and talk about her past. He asks about her life before coming to Italy. Is this supposed to show us he really cares for her? That doesn't convince me....
They bathe in nature, a stunning contrast to the earlier wide shots of the interiors of the rich family homes full of antiques, high ceilings and a lot of art on the walls. She goes from a stifling interior life in a rich family where she is in a certain station with a certain role, to running out of that life in the end, barefoot (she wore heels through the movie til then, usually) in a track suit.
I felt some disgust at her timing when she decides to leave the family home to be with Antonio... and the lack of mourning for her son who died when he hit his head retracting from her after he found out about her affair with Antonio. In that moment, he would not let her speak (oh brother - a super cheap trick to create tension).
Anyway, at the end, her son dies, she finds out and is just frozen, not crumpling on the floor in absolute loss and pain. I wondered if he was adopted? She loved him, I thought! And then next day she is still frozen, obsessed with running away. She was frozen when Antonio took her clothes off the first time. A bit inanimate. So next day when her other children are together mourning after the burial, she runs away. What? You abandon your children when they just lost the sweet emotional faithful brother? Her daughter the lesbian, gave her eye contact understanding and permission to walk out as she stood barefoot in the hallway. The husband had already told her, 'you don't exist' when she confessed in the cemetery that she loved Antonio.
I saw her as a love addict, not in love. These 2 lovers didn't know each other at all... and we didn't get to know them. They were 2 mystery characters attracted by the senses of food and sex and it seems like a connection that will fade easily because it's really a connection that carries her out of her frozen state to a more alive state of self determination... not a case of a strong bond with Antonio. And of course that is, in itself pretty awesome. I just wish we had more insight into Antonio and her in their personal journeys beyond food and sex chemistry.
They bathe in nature, a stunning contrast to the earlier wide shots of the interiors of the rich family homes full of antiques, high ceilings and a lot of art on the walls. She goes from a stifling interior life in a rich family where she is in a certain station with a certain role, to running out of that life in the end, barefoot (she wore heels through the movie til then, usually) in a track suit.
I felt some disgust at her timing when she decides to leave the family home to be with Antonio... and the lack of mourning for her son who died when he hit his head retracting from her after he found out about her affair with Antonio. In that moment, he would not let her speak (oh brother - a super cheap trick to create tension).
Anyway, at the end, her son dies, she finds out and is just frozen, not crumpling on the floor in absolute loss and pain. I wondered if he was adopted? She loved him, I thought! And then next day she is still frozen, obsessed with running away. She was frozen when Antonio took her clothes off the first time. A bit inanimate. So next day when her other children are together mourning after the burial, she runs away. What? You abandon your children when they just lost the sweet emotional faithful brother? Her daughter the lesbian, gave her eye contact understanding and permission to walk out as she stood barefoot in the hallway. The husband had already told her, 'you don't exist' when she confessed in the cemetery that she loved Antonio.
I saw her as a love addict, not in love. These 2 lovers didn't know each other at all... and we didn't get to know them. They were 2 mystery characters attracted by the senses of food and sex and it seems like a connection that will fade easily because it's really a connection that carries her out of her frozen state to a more alive state of self determination... not a case of a strong bond with Antonio. And of course that is, in itself pretty awesome. I just wish we had more insight into Antonio and her in their personal journeys beyond food and sex chemistry.