Under the Tuscan Sun DVD Review:

Thinking her newly divorced friend needs something to cheer her up, Patti (Oh) gives Frances (Lane) a ticket to a ten-day holiday to Tuscany. What she didn’t expect was for her to fall in love with the Italian countryside and buy a villa. Frances sees this as a new start but could she just be running away from problems that will always be there, wherever she is in the world.

The idea of leaving all your problems behind and escaping to a new life could should appealing to most people but throw in the promise of romance and you have the perfect ingredients for a “chick-flick”. Based on the novel by Diane Lane’s character in the movie, Frances Mayes about her memories of renovating her Tuscan house, the filmmakers decided to throw in a romance element to bring in its target audience, women over 35. The good news is that it works quite well but this all down to Diane Lane.

Since receiving her Oscar nomination for “Unfaithful”, studios have finally started to take notice of this talented actress and given her a lead role. The movie is quite a big step for Lane as she is the only real star name in the picture and everything is mounted on her slender shoulders. She grabs the chance however and carries the picture extremely well. This is a likable character and Diane Lane makes her so, making you care what happens to this lonely divorcee as we accompany her on her Tuscan adventure.

There is limited but good support from her surrounding Italian ensemble. There is a nice, incidental story between one of contractors and the girl next door and Frances herself manages to fall for a local Italian man, played nicely by Raoul Bova. Sandra Oh is also good as her pregnant, lesbian friend.

‘Under the Tuscan Sun’ is a nice chick-flick that is never to taxing and panders well to its target audience. Diane Lane is extremely watchable and while the story may go on fifteen minutes too long, there is enough to the film’s message across. Something will come along when you leased expect it. If only life was that simple.

Star Rating = * *

PICTURE & SOUND

Presented in Widescreen 1.85:1 Anamorphic with a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, the transfer is good. The radiant, glorious colours of the Tuscan countryside are vividly brought to life on screen with a beautifully sharp picture. The sound is OK, emphasising dialogue more than anything but the nice score does engulf you at times.

BONUS FEATURES

Audio Commentary by director and screenwriter Audrey Wells
Audrey Wells talks passionately about a movie that she has been developing since 2001. Coming from both a screenwriting and directing prospective, this is an informative commentary from an engaging filmmaker. She discusses the changes she made adapting the book to film and how she combined her own ideas with that of Frances Mayes novel. Wells also talks about casting, location shooting and the fact that the film was in fact an Italian movie shot in English.

Tuscany 101 (9.26 mins)

Screenwriter/director Audrey Wells, author Frances Mayes, executive producer Sandy Koopf, producer Tom Sternberg and stars Diane Lane, Raoul Bova, Sandra Oh and Pawel Szajda talk about bring Under the Tuscan Sun to the big screen. The featurette is your standard making of fare with the cast and crew discussing making the movie, what it was like to work with Diane Lane and the director Audrey Wells and the location of Tuscany. A lot of patting on the back.

Deleted Scenes (2.29 mins)

Three removed scenes entitled ‘The Singing Contractor’, ‘Discovering the Fresco’ and ‘Clapper Montage’. All of these are quite good, especially the discovering the Fresco scene but without a commentary track we don’t know why they didn’t meet the final cut.

Easter Egg (2.36 mins)

This hidden featurette entitled ‘Underwear Addition’ features CG supervisor Joe Francis revealing how he was employed to digitally dress an actor revealing a little too much for a PG-13 movie.

Trailer

A preview of Hope Springs

OVERALL

An average movie gets an average DVD treatment from Touchstone. While the commentary track is better than average, the rest of the bonus material is nothing to right home about. The featurette is your usual backslapping affair but not very informative and the few deleted scenes really needed a commentary to justify there exclusion. Fans will be disappointed with the release.

DVD Star Rating = * *

Jamie Kelwick

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