Up at the Villa

I thought I was going to really enjoy this movie. Sean Penn is one of the finest actors in Hollywood today. He was absolutely brilliant in Dead Man Walking and Carlito's Way, to name just two. Kristen Scott Thomas is always very good. This movie also has an excellent supporting cast (Jacobi's 'I Claudius' still rates as the best performance I've ever seen on PBS). And I have enjoyed almost every movie I've seen dealing with pre-WWII fascist Italy.

But not this one.

To my surprise, this movie seemed to meander from scene to scene. The acting was uninspired and and the emotions did not seem genuine. I was never absorbed into the film and was constantly aware that Penn and Thomas were acting. And Penn seemed completely flat. At times, his low and garbled voice was a bit hard to understand, but I didn't rewind the video to hear what I missed as I just wanted to get on to a more interesting part... which never came. Perhaps this role was beyond Penn. Perhaps he just mailed it in. In any case, I was quite disappointed with this movie.