The Spy in the Sandwich

Friday, July 31, 2020

10:00 AM | The Film Meme No. 97

[97th of 100]. Whenever I feel like love is absent or life is at a standstill, I turn to one film that for me has always been a refuge, a beacon for resilience, and a heartfelt parable for starting over. It's a 2003 melodrama set in Tuscany in Italy, directed by the late Audrey Wells, who took the memoir by the travel writer Frances Mayes and transformed what would have been Good Housekeeping schmaltz into a deep meditation of inviting the good in life in the midst of the bad, being patient for its slow rooting in, and recognizing its fulfilment in whatever surprising form it comes. Fictionalizing much of the autobiographical arc of the book, it follows a successful writer who suddenly finds her life being turned upside down when her husband asks for a divorce, and in lieu of alimony he demands she pays him, asks instead to keep their house for himself ... and a new wife. Devastated, forced to move out to a miserable "divorce hotel," and finding herself in a writing rut, she reluctantly takes up the offer of her lesbian couple friends to take their place in a "gay tour of Tuscany." It will help her find her balance, they say, plus, since it's a gay tour, no straight man will bother her! The whirlwind tour through the Italian countrysides leads to an impulse buy: a rutted villa which she proceeds to renovate with the last of her money and her sanity, with the help of migrant Polish carpenters and a community of eccentrics who slowly take her in to the fabric of their lives. Her renovations, of course, which tests all of her resolve and creativity, is the film's self-conscious allegory for her spiritual reawakening. But it is handled with such delicacy, and full of anecdotal delights [like that scene of a stormy night with only a frightened owl and a painting of the Virgin Mary to keep her company], that we don't mind at all the contrivance. And Diane Lane, as Frances, gives her beleaguered villa-owning lost soul such beauty and depth she somehow makes her character's journey generous enough in its examinations of life's twists and turns that it becomes an invitation for us to make that journey also ours. Thus, in becoming a very capable avatar, she makes the movie our very own. How many times have I exhaled at the movie's satisfying end, as if having been recharged with its wisdom? It has really become my go-to medicine for heartbreak, and something I prescribe to friends whenever they call for help in arresting the growing doldrums around them. I know the film also works for others because most of them come to thank me later on for recommending it -- so much so that some of the movie's lines have become our shortcuts for living reminders: "Ladybugs! Lots and lots of ladybugs!" for example, means to stop looking so actively for love, because the right love for you will find its way to you. "Terrible ideas. Don't you just love those?," means to trust the unexpected, and to follow where it may lead -- despite the fear of the unknown. There are other lines I have come to inscribe in my heart. A reminder for always living in the moment: "Never lose your childish innocence. It is the most important thing." A reminder for taking on what seems to be overwhelming: "The trick to overcoming buyer's remorse is to have a plan. Pick one room and make it yours. Go slowly through the house. Be polite, introduce yourself, so it can introduce itself to you." A reminder for thinking out of the box: "What are four walls, anyway? They are what they contain. The house protects the dreamer. Unthinkably good things can happen, even late in the game. It's such a surprise." And this golden one, delivered by Sandra Oh, which has got to be the best reminder for when to pick yourself up in a rut: "I think you're in danger. Of never recovering. You know when you come across one of those empty-shell people? And you think, 'What the hell happened to you?' Well, there came a time in each one of those lives where they were at a crossroads. Someplace where they had to decide to turn left or right. This is no time to be a chickenshit." God knows we need films like this, especially in the most trying of times. We are always facing crossroads, and it's good to be reminded once in a while never to be chicken shit. What's the film?

For the introduction to this meme, read here.

Labels: film, life, love