Now that this thing has been beautifully restored with a blu-ray release, hopefully it finds more of an audience. It certainly deserves it. I caught a screening of the 2016 restoration and just from a visual perspective it was ravishing and magnificently well-crafted. I went into it cold, not knowing one iota about the plot and only buying a ticket due to its status among film buffs. There is one thing I need to get out of the way now: this is not a movie you only watch once and expect to fully understand or unravel. There is a whole lot going on here. The plot itself is like a more baroque, enigmatic and psychological version of Jules et Jim, as well as a journey through the adult life of three friends in post-war Italy. But that's only the skeleton of a very complex whole, and by the end the viewer has pondered love, social status, politics, war, art and philosophy, among other things. And yet the whole work is just so light on its feet, like a bird waltzing through. The pacing is masterful, moving the story and images along relentlessly but still finding the space it needs to get under your skin before you really know where it's headed or what it's truly saying (brilliantly, those aspects only gradually become apparent as the film glides along). Characters weave in and out and you find that, somehow, you care about all of them, and that they all have their flaws and strengths like actual people. The camerawork is immaculate and well-thought out on a technical level but, sans perhaps a few shots, never pretentious, whatever that word may mean to you. Homages to past classics are abundant, as this is as much a movie about cinema itself as it is a drama and comedy. Speaking of which, this movie is simply hilarious. Above, I may have seemed to be describing a chore to sit through, some kind of grand drama, but rest assured this is anything but. Ettore Scola's most important touch of brilliance is the off-kilter, irreverent tone he employs for much of the movie, never quite full romance, or comedy, or political film, or art treatise, or psychological drama, but operating in a weirdly effective middle land between all of those things. The humor comes unexpectedly but is always sharp when it does, and the whole thing is just so entertaining to watch. There were lines and even whole scenes that made me laugh so hard I nearly spilled my coffee. Stefania Sandrelli was very easy on the eyes so that helped as well.
Review of We All Loved Each Other So Much
