The Great Beauty Review

The Great Beauty

It is interesting to compare The Great Beauty to the recent release of Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby in the way both films present a depiction of wealth and excess through parties and cinematically unrestrained dance sequences. Not to mention a title that alludes to the novel’s, director Paolo Sorrentino announces his presence amongst the cinematic greats through the subject matter of the film. Although this presence could be read as premature due to Sorrentino’s filmography it is this confidence behind the character and allusions that establishes The Great Beauty as worthy of contemporary praise.

Through the view and narration of main character Jeb Gambardella we go through the repetitive nature of elitist Italian society. Jeb narrates to the audience in chapter breaks the phoniness behind the events (one being his routine during funerals to subtly switch the focus from the deceased to himself) All while taking part in the culture as if it has become a part of him. Jeb has not always lived atop of a building with the background of the Romanian Coliseum, in fact, Rome imprisons him as he daydreams back to moments of his early years before he wrote his novel that plunged him into the grasps of Italian upper class. Triggered by a death of the woman that rejected him before his fame and the knowledge that she wrote in her diary about him more so than her husband of many years, Jeb tries to break out using passive aggressive insults and romantic connections with a stripper (Sabrina Ferilli). Although a negative depiction of the rich is nothing new or groundbreaking it is the way that Sorrentino handles it and through the performance of Toni Serivllo that elevates the film.

We are not introduced to Jeb until fifteen minutes into the film. His is introduced by a woman wearing a bra stating happy 65th birthday who includes Jeb’s congratulates in the same sentence as Rome, bridging the connection between the two. Directly after, Jeb turns in accordance with the dance music, with a grin and cigarette, kissed by fellow writer on the check and a woman on the mouth. Before the introduction it takes a while to find Jeb in the crowd but we are well aware by the end of the dazzling scene that he is the center of it. Servillo’s performance of boosting confidence but also vulnerable during certain key scenes such as the funeral allows the comparisons many critics have made to great italian films such as La Dolce Vita, 8 ½, and El Norte.

The excess in the characters are matched by the camerawork of Luca Bigazzi as he establishes right from the beginning that the camera, like the characters, will not stay still. Swooping shots accompanied by operatic music in scenes dealing with religion, death, and memories highlight the larger nature of these themes while the quick cuts, sped up dolly shots and club music gives insights to the lack of intimacy between the wealthy characters.

It is hard to think of criticisms of The Great Beauty, the film is layered with ideas of age, death, friendships, intimacy and love that heighten the attack against elitism into a much more nuanced look into how one gets accepted into the system and the struggle to escape it while acknowledging that need to embrace it. Played in the background of the film is Jeb’s thirst for something new through the mystery of what goes on in his neighbor’s apartment, by the end of the film we get insight into it and it is just as uncomfortable to the point of almost being repulsive as the last of the many party/dance sequences toward the end of the film.