A Slow Month
Miss Bentley (Vanessa Redgrave - Mother's Boys) had spent the past 16 years staying in the same villa on Lake Coma during the month of April and this year, 1937, is no different other than her father who had holidayed with her has recently passed away. But this year she finds herself spending time with Major Wishaw (Edward Fox - Robin Hood) who has interesting ears but is a bit cantankerous. But the Major finds his attention drawn to Miss Beaumont (Uma Thurman - Final Analysis), an attractive young American who has been employed as a nanny to an Italian family and who enjoys flirting with the Major to relieve the boredom.
Oh dear, "A Month by the Lake" is a perfectly fine movie about a romance between shall we say a couple of more mature people in the beautiful sunlit Italy. It has lots of beautiful shots of the wonderful Italian scenery and some nice musical elements as well. But this is one of those slower than slow movies which did nothing for me, nothing what so ever and, as you can guess, I found it slow, not really going anywhere nature pretty tedious. There is an air of Merchant Ivory about it with its focus on these romantic ramblings as Miss Bentley is drawn to Major Wishaw whilst she gets the attention of young Italian men and he is flirted with by the younger Miss Beaumont. But the slowness makes it a struggle to watch.
What this all boils down to is that "A Month by the Lake" was not for me and ended up a very slow unrewarding experience. Yet there is nothing wrong with it as it has nice imagery, beautiful music and nice performances, it is just the story and pacing of it left me bored.
