Movie Review: The Great Beauty (aka La Grande Bellezza) (2013)

The Great Beauty(La Grande Bellazza) is an Italian film centered around the character Jep Gambardella(Toni Servillo), a journalist who is among Rome's social elite class.  Jep has turned 65 years old and the movie shows his interactions and his view of life after his birthday.

Toni Servillo as Jep is brilliant in this film.  He needs to be as this is all about hi as Jep and the way he navigates his life in Rome.  The film starts at Jep's 65th birthday and it's quite the party.  The beautiful people of Rome's social elite are there and it's a wild time filled with music and dancing.  This is where we start to see Jep pondering life.  Jep is in the social elite, not because he is a journalist, but because of a novel he wrote.  As the movie progresses, we see Jep's character progress and his sharp wit is on display when he grows tired of the elitism displayed by some of his counterparts.  I also really enjoyed when Jep decided to bring an unlikely someone into his inner circle.  The choice had some ramifications on his own psyche.  Again, Toni Servillo is brilliant.

The Great Beauty is directed by Paolo Sorrentino and you can see this is his homage to Federico Fellini.  The way Sorrentino was able to navigate through all of these lives but keeping Jep the central focus was wonderful.  I took notice in the focus on faces.  There were scenes of people at parties and we were treated with the focus on their faces which visually told you what was going on.  The film takes place in Rome so the backdrop to every shot had exquisite beauty.  Thhe Great Beauty was truly a pleasure to view.

I received this film in the Boxwalla Movie Subscription Box.  You can read my box review at HelloSubscription.com.

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