To Rome with Love (2012)

In recent years, Woody Allen films have seemed to be more about their setting than anything else. This is not inherently a bad thing, as Allen’s love for the various metropolises of the world can be felt in every passing project. However, this reverence for the surroundings can sometimes make the characters and story feel secondary; creating a pleasant enough but ultimately minor film experience. To Rome with Love, his latest film, doesn’t necessarily break that trend, but Allen’s exploration of Rome as a sort of living organism has an infectious energy to it that much of his recent output hasn’t quite achieved. It’s as unfocused as a film can possibly be, but it’s chock full of too many memorable moments to be dismissed as an inane travelogue.

To Rome with Love is an ensemble piece that flips between a handful of unconnected stories, though there are some minor thematic associations to be made. Alec Baldwin stars as John, an experienced architect who once lived in Rome as a young man. While nostalgically roaming the streets, he runs into a younger architect (Jesse Eisenberg) who lives with his girlfriend Sally (an underused Greta Gerwig). When Sally’s actress friend Monica (Ellen Page) comes to town, Eisenberg must fight his desires to cheat all while Baldwin—who eventually becomes a less-than-physical being—looks on in judgment and, occasionally, awe. Meanwhile, Roberto Benigni plays a regular middle-aged guy who one day becomes famous for no reason and must deal with the sudden attention.

Yet another story involves newlyweds Antonio (Alessandro Tiberi) and Milly (Alessandra Mastronardi) as they visit Rome on their honeymoon. Through strange circumstances/coincidences, the two of them wind up separated for the day and must go on their own individual adventures in which they must face head-on their transition from youth into marriage. Finally, Allen himself appears as Jerry, the father of a young woman named Hayley (Alison Pill) who has just gotten engaged to a handsome Italian gentleman (Flavio Parenti). Jerry is newly-retired and constantly bickers playfully with his wife Phyllis (Judy Davis), but while in Rome he sees an opportunity for big business in a golden-voiced mortician named Luca (Antonio Albanese).

Strangely enough, it is Allen’s own plotline that winds up feeling the most undercooked. What could have been an interesting look at the dynamics between two families from different worlds ultimately devolves into an intermittently-amusing extended sketch about a guy who can only sing well when he’s in the shower. It’s fun to watch the actors interact with each other, but by the end this particular story loses any steam and charm it once had. (It also doesn’t end as much as it just peters out.) The other three plots are much more rewarding, even if they’re all somewhat routine. The most consistently enjoyable story belongs to Tiberi and Mastronardi, who elevate a sitcom-level plot and turn it into a fascinating and funny reflection on the lives they’ve led so far. Most of the humor comes from a small part by Penélope Cruz as a call girl that gets thrown into Tiberi’s life at the worst possible moment.

While all the stories explore themes of fame and what impact people look to accomplish in their short lives, attempts to glean a single, overriding message from To Rome with Love will likely turn out to be unfruitful. Allen has essentially admitted that the film is the result of a) an offer that was extended to make a film in Rome, and b) a handful of story ideas he had jotted down over time. This was not a meticulously-made film, but Allen—a man who continues to make a new film yearly at the age of 76, god bless him—is not necessarily known for his Kubrickian attention to detail. There’s something to be said for his method of coming up with ideas, making them reality and getting them out there for public consumption. The upside is that he keeps working; the downside is that there’s less potential for him to make a true masterpiece. However, if this annual system is cranking out films as eminently enjoyable as To Rome with Love, it’s hard to argue with it.

In many ways, I prefer the unfocused jumble of this film to the bland handsomeness of last year’s Midnight in Paris, which made a ton of money and won Allen his fourth Academy Award. I enjoyed Midnight as far as it went, but it often felt like a flimsy love letter to Paris that never really bothered with telling an interesting story about the here and now. To Rome with Love is certainly a flimsy love letter, but it’s a love letter done through a series of short stories about four different groups of people and how their experiences in this city altered their lives, however slightly. If Allen is to continue his cinematic European vacation, I hope they all his trips can be as genuinely fun as this.

Grade: B+