THE 34th PORTLAND INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, DAY 7

"come undone," italy, dir. silvio soldini

this movie should have been at least ten times sexier. unlike literary fiction, narrative film is perfectly suited to the challenges of presenting sex in a sexy way that can also be thought provoking, titillating without lapsing into straight up pornography. anna lives with her doting partner, a big, dorky guy who dotes on her obsessively. domenico has a wife and two children. anna and domenico meet when domenico is cater waitering a party at anna's office. they embark on an affair -- "a heated affair," says the festival program, "punctuated by sordid erotic encounters." the poster for "come undone" suggests the same, but the encounters depicted in the movie are really anything but. not much sordid has a chance to happen in the fifteen seconds it takes domenico to climax the first time he beds anna. they do, granted, have their weekly trysts at a love hotel that keeps customers' ids until they check out, but their sex is just of the good vanilla variety, which is simply the essential element lacking from either character's more committed partnership. i did, however, appreciate that the "come undone" was more of an introduction to "topics and issues in infidelity" than a close up of anna and domenico's relationship itself. there's no solid dialogue or action that precipitates their pairing. they're about to ravage each other in anna's office after hours after briefly flirting twice. there's something hot between them, but that something isn't explained or investigated, just presented as a basis for the problems that their affair causes them. and even if the sex wasn't all it could have been (sure, it would have made "come undone" a different picture, but i still felt duped), i liked the editing: quick cuts that seemed to layer still images in an way that struck me as very true to the naked eye, an artifice that succeeded in mimicking a very realistic effect.

the first thing i remember thinking after the projectionist finally got the subtitles high enough that they were visible onscreen was that anna (played by alba rohrwacher, who also played the daughter of tilda swinton's character in "i am love") looked like an internet photo morph of japanese pop idol ayumi hamasaki and metric front lady emily haines. the last thing i remember was being roused from a stupor that i hadn't realized falling into when the final shot transitioned to the credits. heated affairs shouldn't make you want to fall asleep.