The Great Beauty by Paolo Sorrentino

On Sunday night we headed out to the movies. We looked at previews online and the Italian movie "The Great Beauty" looked like the best on offer. The preview was charming, and since adolescence I've always been a sucker for subtitled movies. They make me feel somehow more sophisticated and worldly. The movie exceeded expectations. It was lovely, strange and thought provoking. Unlike so many Hollywood movies, this movie left much up to you in terms of filling in the blanks and making your own judgments. It was adult in the best sense of the word. In particular I loved how the dream sequences were presented in a factual episodic style just like the waking segments. It was only the strangeness of the dreams that made you realize what they were. In some ways it is "La Dolce Vita" for our time, but unlike that film it focuses on literary vs. cinema types. The main character is a charming rascal - full of wit, intelligence and some amount of malice, both towards himself and others. This movie made me want to stay up all night long and take up cigarettes once again. After the movie ended and we were walking to get a drink Heidi said to me, " I feel like that movie allowed me to see inside your head." A great compliment indeed as the protagonist's head contains a complex landscape. I left the film resolved to dress better.