Summertime DVD | Movie Mail UK | DVDs and Blu-ray films direct

Star Review

This wonderful film was David Lean’s first motion picture to be made outside the UK, before he became an international success with such classics as Bridge On The River Kwai and Lawrence Of Arabia. Summertime stars Katharine Hepburn as an insecure spinster who travels to Venice and is astonished by the city’s beauty. However, she feels desperately lonely, and slowly strikes up an unlikely relationship with a handsome shopkeeper (Rossano Brazzi, best known for South Pacific). Gradually their friendship turns passionate, but a wrenching revelation threatens their love – will she take a risk and stay in Venice, or leave with her blissful memories?

There are some marvellous comedy scenes throughout Summertime; as crass as it sounds on paper, the sequence where Hepburn falls into a canal – a stunt that temporarily blinded the actress - is so beautifully played (and observed) that it remains a great comedy moment. The film also pokes gentle fun at cultural stereotypes; a brash American couple steal many scenes (they are amazed at the “hundreds of paintings - all of them done by hand”), as does a comical street urchin who develops a touching rapport with Hepburn. Venice has never looked more stunning, with gorgeous cinematography from Jack Hildyard and lingering shots of the city’s beautiful architecture.

The film is at its very best in the scenes between Hepburn and Brazzi; the moment where she hesitates away from him for fear of embracing her new found feelings is heartrending – although an actress who specialised in dominant, forthright females, Hepburn conveys her character’s anxieties beautifully. The chemistry between the two leads is electric, from their first kiss to a touching moment when he tries to rescue her flower from the canal. Both Hepburn and Lean were nominated for Oscars, and the daring directorial choices add immeasurably to the film’s emotional impact. During one charged embrace, a multitude of fireworks thunder in the background, a metaphor that has become a cliché fifty years later. Here, however, the juxtaposition works perfectly, recalling Jeanette Winterson’s beautiful observation on love: while the fireworks last, the sky is a different colour.

Alex Davidson on 12th July 2007

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