Avanti!

Rating:
Summary: Beautiful scenery, fine acting and catchy sound track.
Review: I don't understand why this picture is not more well-known; it has it all. While Lemmon, Mills et al do a fine job, Clive Revill's performance as the hotel manager is a tour de force and worthy of a Supporting Actor Academy Award. If you want to feel good, watch it, taking care not to miss any of the asides and throwaway lines. The scenery and music complement the action wonderfully.

Rating:
Summary: AVANTI
Review: If your depressed, need a holiday, think that everything is against you, then you need to see Avanti! This is a true Jack Lemon comedy and Billy Wilder at his directorial best. As you watch the film you will be taken to the real Italy where lunch is more important than making money, where making love is to be savored and marriage is what you do at the end of the day.
I write this not as film review but as a strong recommendation to your soul - buy Avanti on DVD becasue if you get on VHS, your and your family wear it out! As they say in the film, "you bet your sweet buttouti!"

Rating:
Summary: AVANTI
Review: If your depressed, need a holiday, think that everything is against you, then you need to see Avanti! This is a true Jack Lemon comedy and Billy Wilder at his directorial best. As you watch the film you will be taken to the real Italy where lunch is more important than making money, where making love is to be savored and marriage is what you do at the end of the day.
I write this not as film review but as a strong recommendation to your soul - buy Avanti on DVD becasue if you get on VHS, your and your family wear it out! As they say in the film, "you bet your sweet buttouti!"

Rating:
Summary: The Closest You'll Get to Seeing Kristen Dunst's Breasts
Review: Kevin Kline admitted that his inspiration to become an actor had to do with his infactuation over Hayley Mills and figured the only way he'd ever meet her was to become a movie star. Well I had no idea that her sister would make me feel the same way. Unfortunately, this movie was made before I was even born so I'm sure she's far from looking the way she looked back then. Fortunately, there's the spitting image of her in today's 'it' girl Kirsten Dunst. Anyway, the movie itself is good. Just about anything with Jack Lemmon as a chief role is always good. I recommend this to anyone who likes romantic comedies.

Rating:
Summary: un' ora sola ti vorrei...
Review: that is the song, the leitmotiv... it looks like a so simple story
but in fact, it seems like there were so many films in only one!! what were really our parents??? what were the secrets they couldn't share with the other ones even children? and above all: how they finally manage, beyond the death, to learn us the way of life, the way of love and happiness! of course, the two actors : Lemmon and Mils are absolutely fabulous! on my opinion, one of the most marvellous film of Billy Wilder... unfortunately too unknown! and, as for those who really love the Jack Lemmon's Art, an essentiel film!!
the telephone conversations with his wife!!... how to describe them??? it's amazing!! the scene in the morgue... a sort of masterpiece! all the others characters are extraordinary painted too! So... do me a favour! forgive my very very bad english but rush at " AVANTI" as soon as possible!!

Rating:
Summary: SAME TIME NEXT YEAR
Review: There's nothing too complicated about the plot. A rich American businessman played by Jack Lemmon has to make a sudden trip to Italy to claim the body of his father who was killed in an auto accident. He meets a young English woman, played by Juliet Mills, who has come to Italy to claim the body of her mother who, it turns out, died with Lemmon's father. It seems that these two were in the midst of their annual month long tryst. For many years they had been meeting at exactly the same date at exactly the same Italian resort for what was obviously their raison d'etre.

Strait-laced Lemmon is shocked that his father could possibly behave in such a manner. Life loving Mills is thrilled that her mother had found love and happiness. The rest of the plot consists of the complications of dealing with Italian bureaucracy and the evolution of Lemmon's character from cold efficient American businessman to a warm loving human being. Mills has "just a bit" to do with these changes in Lemmon.

There was a running gag throughout the movie that exactly reflected my own experiences in Italy. The morgue was closed until 4:00 because it was lunch time. There were no taxis because it was lunch time. A helicopter was told not to land at a local airport because it was lunch time. In my own experience, when attempting to cash some travelers' checks in Rome, I was made to wait at a bank window for over 30 minutes while the cashier finished his sandwich and looked at a newspaper. No, no other window cashed travelers' checks and yes, he'd take care of me when he was ready, but he wasn't ready yet. I think that the feeling of "been there, done that" really added to my enjoyment of AVANTI, and the jokes built around the Italian inefficiencies did a lot to create the atmosphere of the whole movie.

You don't have to have been there, however, to enjoy this movie. It's warm and funny on its own. Lemmon and Mills seem destined for one another, and the hotel manager, played by Clive Revill, who is obviously in love with love, adds another dimension of humor. No great drama, but loving good-natured comedy is what you can expect from AVANTI.

Rating:
Summary: Wilder's last masterpiece.
Review: This film about double lives (public/private; parent/child; alive/dead) appropriately offers two pleasures for the price of one. You can enjoy this film as a thoroughly sympathetic, funny, moving romantic comedy, achieving a difficult balance of wit and sentiment. Or you could watch it as a typically caustic Wilder satire about American hypocrisy, about learning, from Dad, how to be better at it - there are some very dark insinuations here (about American industrial practice, for a start) that cannot be overridden.

Being a nice person, Wilder allows us to enjoy both. You can throw all the flaws you like at 'Avanti' - too theatrical, too much trading in stereotypes etc. - because the good things are imperishable: extraordinary acting (especially Clive Revill as Carlucci), subtle visual patterning, unpredictable incident and funny dialogue, and a lovely, unabashedly sentimental score. Better than most of Wilder's more revered works.

Rating:
Summary: A gem
Review: This is a sweet film. Romantic, funny and poignant. The story is typically Wilder - witty and well observed. The scenery and filming a delight. However it's the acting, particularly the on-screen rapport between Lemmon and Mills, that make this film so special.Lemmon, as always, exhibits perfect comedic timing, and Mills carefully displays both a truly wonderful sense of comedy as well as touching pathos when required. She is an absolute delight in this film. The only reason I feel that this has not become as well recognised as a great Wilder film is possibly it's length -the side story and scenes with Lemmon's character and the trottor brothers could have been eliminated. Overall,however, the film is a true gem.

Rating:
Summary: America Business Man collides with Italian 'La dolce vita'
Review: This is a wonderful Jack Lemmon Classic. An american business man who needs to travel to Italia is first offended but later on starts to understand that there is more in life than making money. Beautiful comedy at wonderful setting on Ischia off Naples. In case you are American you should be prepared to laugh about yourself otherwise you might find it offending. I loved it and I am not Italian.

Rating:
Summary: One of the Top Five Romantic Comedies of All Time
Review: This is an excellent romantic comedy, beautifully written and perfectly cast. Jack Lemmon, Juliet Mills, and Clive Reville all give great performances, and the plot is twisty, funny, and tender without ever being soppy or contrived. I wish I could write this well.