‘I Am Love’ Offers Scintillating Showcase For Tilda Swinton

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Rating: 4.0/5.0

CHICAGO – “I Am Love” is the type of visceral tone poem that requires its audience to feel more than think. As the end credits roll, viewers may find themselves going over the plot in their heads, and discovering its inherent shallowness. It’s only after we wake up from a dream that we discover just how silly or inexplicable it all was.

Italian filmmaker Luca Guadagnino has created a romance so punch-drunk on passion that it forgets to tell a decent story. Any trashy romance novel available in the bargain box at Borders could probably tell a tale as complex and unpredictable as this one. Once the gears of the plot start grinding away, there’s no turning back. The melodramatic plot twists are a hoot, and threaten to derail the film into all-out lunacy toward the end. But this is one rare instance where a film’s style is so utterly spellbinding that it manages to more or less compensate for the shortcomings of its story. It’s no masterpiece, but it’s probably one of the best films in cinema history that warrants comparison to a trashy romance novel.

Film buffs will appreciate Guadagnino’s affectionate homages to the Sirkian theme of forbidden love between classes, as well as Visconti’s portrayal of the upper-crust Milanese. The movie opens at a family gathering where the key characters only gradually emerge from the crowd. There’s a wonderful high-angle shot in which a chandelier appears to pin the family members to the floor as they assemble for dinner. The elderly patriarch passes on ownership of his industrial company to son Tancredi (Pippo Delbono), and grandson Edoardo (Flavio Parenti). This gets in the way of Edoardo’s plans to open a restaurant with his friend, the gifted chef Antonio (Edoardo Gabbriellini). It’s the turn of the century in Milan, and as the seasons change, so do the hearts and fates of these privileged yet sheltered souls.

I Am Love
Photo credit: Magnolia

The real crux of the action emerges deep into the film, when Tancredi’s wife Emma (Tilda Swinton), a Russian immigrant trapped in a passionless marriage, finds herself falling for Antonio. It’s here that “I Am Love” begins to move with the ebb and flow of a rapturous fever dream, as the characters become intoxicated by the allure of sudden passion. Swinton, whose red hair and pale skin often inspires comparisons to Conan O’Brien, has rarely looked more ravishing. She nails her character’s Italian dialect (deftly tinged with a Russian inflection), while capturing her rediscovered eroticism, whether through the sensual stroking of a tree branch, or the savoring of a particularly good meal.

It also becomes apparent about halfway through the film that Guadagnino is as infatuated with Swinton as Almodovar is with Penelope Cruz. Guadagnino is, of course, the director whose filmography includes a documentary short entitled, “Tilda Swinton: The Love Factory.” Yet unlike Cruz, who only seems to come alive under Almodovar’s lens, Swinton has flourished in her collaborations with a host of filmmakers, revealing countless different shades to her genius in roles as diverse as the sex-changing nobleman in “Orlando,” the pregnant mother oblivious to her husband’s abusive nature in “The War Zone,” and the desperate alcoholic kidnapper in “Julia.” Though Emma in “Love” is most likely not a role that Swinton will be long remembered for, it does at least allow color to return to her cheeks, often in the form of a zestful blush. It’s a refreshing alternative to the ice queen roles that Hollywood has tried to typecast her within, most notably in “Michael Clayton,” which was far from her most Oscar-worthy film to date.

I Am Love
Photo credit: Magnolia

The saddest thing about “I Am Love” is the simple fact that if the script were up to par with the rest of the picture, it may have become something more resonant than merely a glorified love letter to one of our greatest screen actresses. There are some over-the-top crises toward the end that feel so cheap and tacked on that they drain the plot of its credibility right when it’s attempting to take flight. Yet if the film is viewed purely on the level of sexually charged wish-fulfillment, it is the cinematic equivalent of a gourmet feast when compared to the fast food diet offered by the “Twilight” saga. Unlike those laborious celebrations of pre-tweener lust, “I Am Love” is actually a joy to watch.

Cinematographer Yorick Le Saux pulls off various feats of movie magic, as his camera glides effortlessly around the action. There’s an extraordinary moment when the camera follows Swinton down a spiral showcase as she seeks a quick kiss from Antonio, in what is surely one of the most spectacular yet unpretentious Steadicam shots in recent memory. The music by acclaimed composer John Adams is always vibrant and alive, particularly during the delirious final sequence, though its conspicuous presence draws unnecessary attention to itself, announcing to viewers that they are indeed watching a MOVIE! “I Am Love” may not be great film art, but it does triumph as a movie lover’s delight.

By MATT FAGERHOLM Staff Writer HollywoodChicago.com matt@hollywoodchicago.com