"Summertime" (The Movie)

I don't think I've talked about the movie "Summertime" before, and even if I have, I'm going to talk about it again, because it's "Movie Monday" and it's the movie I watched the most recently. 

I first saw "Summertime" last summer. It's an incredible movie starring a fairly young Katharine Hepburn as an American tourist in Venice in the mid-1950s. The movie starts when she arrives and ends when she leaves, even though we know that she's been doing other travelling in Europe and is planning to do more after we say good-bye. Because of its setting, I first watched the movie when Christopher was in Venice last summer and I was home in Minneapolis. (Don't worry--he was on a family trip, so I wasn't simply left behind or anything.)

I was drawn into the movie by the long loving scenes of Venice. The architecture and the art, the people and the culture, the canals and the fireworks--everything is included in the movie. I watched Katharine as she was romanced by the city, and fell for Rossano Brazzi right along with her. When her gardenia was lost in the canal I felt the tug at my heart, too. (And... wow... was it great to hear from Christopher the next time he called from overseas!)

This weekend, Christopher brought "Summertime" with us on our trip to Tofte. I had loved the movie so much that I bought it for him, but he hadn't yet had a chance to watch it. It was strange to watch it again--this time with him, instead of simply imagining him there. This time Christopher could fill me in with stories of "We walked down that alleyway" and "You actually can't see that view from there." He explained the reason for the different colored chairs in the Piazza San Marco. And, somehow, the story was both more engrossing and less so with Christopher on the couch next to me. 

You see... "Summertime" is filled with incongruities. Beautiful flaws which make the movie--and the fantasy of a summer fling--more powerful. Jane Hudson (Katharine's character in the movie) is warned of this at the outset, too, when, while marvelling at the canals, she watches someone empty trash from an upper window directly into the water in front of her. I don't know if she recognizes that foreshadowing, though. And I don't think I noticed that the first time I watched the movie, either. On Saturday while we were watching it, though, I think what I saw was the beauty in spite of--and even enhanced by--the flaws. 

And, yet, that said, I'm now back to dreaming about two things: 1) The warmth of Summer; and 2) taking a marvellously romantic trip to Venice. After all, as winter begins to set in, we all need a fantasy to hold on to, right?