I love this stuff, situations where you have copies of movies: remakes, many sequels, "homages." That way you can transcend certain weaknesses of a project. Its because when you come to a film cold, the context is merely the universe of other films which is to say the stories we use in imagining our lives. When its a remake like this, that context collapses to the previous film and what we see are the differences. In intelligent subsequents, these extend and annotate. In dumb ones like this they reinvent.
The original film depended on you knowing that it was a film made by Germans about German limitations. German thought is mechanical, constrained, learned. German food is as well, even when using the styles from elsewhere. So a well-regimented, obsessive kitchen is a great cinematic metaphor for the world in which our heroine is captured. When we see her prison, we see the emotional prison Germans consider themselves in. So it matters that the interloper is Italian, essentially a lower body emotional intuitive. And it matters that the regime of the kitchen is suffused with music.
It even matters that the music is opera, that one thing that remains from Italian art that can be said to be both emotionally deep (embodied) and strictly oh so strictly ordered. The original, therefore, mattered. It worked. It touched, avoiding the limits of the traditional romantic story. Its all about transcending constraints. Incidentally, in touching this, the original understood female stereotypes better, including the use of the redhead shorthand.
It mattered that the original included the father and his social standing.
I've never been impressed by Zeta-Jones as an actress, though her entertainment gig in "Chicago" was impressive. Here, she is photographed to her disadvantage. The poster for the film understood her one charming pose. It doesn't appear in the film, and her face is lit as an object in the environment rather than the focus it normally would be.
That environmental perspective is where this film is superior to the original for me. Where nearly all the values are watered down to satisfy an apparently unsophisticated American market, the movement and order of the kitchen are better delivered here than in the original. The food is more immediately succulent. The smells, flames, tastes, are closer. The score helps.
Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.
The original film depended on you knowing that it was a film made by Germans about German limitations. German thought is mechanical, constrained, learned. German food is as well, even when using the styles from elsewhere. So a well-regimented, obsessive kitchen is a great cinematic metaphor for the world in which our heroine is captured. When we see her prison, we see the emotional prison Germans consider themselves in. So it matters that the interloper is Italian, essentially a lower body emotional intuitive. And it matters that the regime of the kitchen is suffused with music.
It even matters that the music is opera, that one thing that remains from Italian art that can be said to be both emotionally deep (embodied) and strictly oh so strictly ordered. The original, therefore, mattered. It worked. It touched, avoiding the limits of the traditional romantic story. Its all about transcending constraints. Incidentally, in touching this, the original understood female stereotypes better, including the use of the redhead shorthand.
It mattered that the original included the father and his social standing.
I've never been impressed by Zeta-Jones as an actress, though her entertainment gig in "Chicago" was impressive. Here, she is photographed to her disadvantage. The poster for the film understood her one charming pose. It doesn't appear in the film, and her face is lit as an object in the environment rather than the focus it normally would be.
That environmental perspective is where this film is superior to the original for me. Where nearly all the values are watered down to satisfy an apparently unsophisticated American market, the movement and order of the kitchen are better delivered here than in the original. The food is more immediately succulent. The smells, flames, tastes, are closer. The score helps.
Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.