MOVIE REVIEW
“Rio, I Love You”
Grade: D+
Starring Vincent Cassel, Harvey Keitel and John Turturro. Directed by 10 directors including Guillermo Arriaga, Vicente Amorim and Im Sang-Soo.
Rated R for language and brief sexuality/nudity. Check listings for theaters. 1 hour, 50 minutes.
Bottom line: Wonderful to look at, but the writing is terrible
There are more than 6 million potential love stories in Rio de Janeiro. Unfortunately, none of the 10 that have been assembled in the anthology film “Rio, I Love You” is any good.
Ten directors have created 10 interwoven vignettes that, for nearly two hours, provide moments of mild amusement, tepid melodrama and, for relief, great music. “La Fortuna,” from director Paolo Sorrentino (“The Great Beauty”) is typical of the film’s misfires. Dorothy (Emily Mortimer) is a former model who thinks that her wealthy older husband (Basil Hoffman) may have died during their flight to Rio. To her chagrin, he’s merely asleep, and he gets the last laugh. It’s a sitcom setup, but as the entire tale unfolds in less than 10 minutes, it’s a sitcom for people with short attention spans.
That failed segment spotlights what little “Rio, I Love You” has to offer: beautiful scenery and a terrific soundtrack, in this case Luiz Gonzaga’s vibrant 1974 dance number “O Fole Roncou.” But despite the nod to local music, there’s no compelling reason to set this episode in Brazil.
Notably, none of the actors or directors of those two segments are, in fact, Brazilian. Unfortunately, the directors who are don’t fare much better. Fernando Meirelles (“City of God”) directs Vincent Cassel as Zé, a beach bum who makes a sand sculpture of Rodin’s “The Kiss.” He tears this down when he sees a beautiful young woman on the boardwalk, and builds a grotesque sculpture of her feet. Believe it or not, this segment is called “The Muse.”
With 10 directors, incoherence is a concern. But shifting tones are not the problem here. The film’s editors weave the strands of this scattered tapestry as well as can be expected, and the film is wonderful to look at. It’s just that the writing is consistently terrible.
And let’s not even get into the vampire story.
The film gives us one character who might actually have a dramatic inner life. Directed by Andrucha Waddington, “Mrs. Nobody” follows a homeless woman (Fernanda Montenegro, so terrific in “Central Station”) whose reasons for going off the grid are never stated. Her grandson Leandro (Eduardo Sterblitch) approaches her, telling her his family told him she was dead. The segment ends with them walking into a public fountain, a baptism of cheap sentiment.
“Rio, I Love You” is the third film in the “Cities of Love” series, after “Paris, Je t’Aime” and “New York, I Love You.” If this latest installment is any indication, all that jet-setting should be avoided. You can have just as much fun staying home.
