SUMMERTIME
UK, 1955, 102 minutes, Colour.
Katharine Hepburn, Rossano Brazzi, Isa Miranda, Darren McGavin?, Mari Aldon.
Directed by David Lean.
Summertime is reputedly David Lean’s favourite film from amongst all his works. David Lean had made an impressive beginning in directing, along with Noel Coward, for In Which We Serve, a war effort film of 1942. He followed it up with two Noel Coward adaptations, This Happy Breed and Blithe Spirit. He then moved to Dickens with the classics Great Expectations and Oliver Twist. In the early 1950s he made Breaking Through the Sound Barrier and Hobson’s Choice. With Summertime, he moved into the international arena and was to make only four films after this, most meticulously, most demandingly, but winning an Oscar for The Bridge Over the River Kwai as well as Lawrence of Arabia. His other films were Doctor Zhivago, Ryan’s Daughter. He spent a lot of time preparing a film version of Nostromo but was able to film only his version of Ian Forster’s A Passage to India.
The main attractions for Summertime are Katharine Hepburn in a role which suits her very well, a rather repressed spinster travelling alone to Venice and absorbing its atmosphere of romance but very hesitant when paid attention by Rossano Brazzi. The other attraction is the city of Venice which has never looked to good in any film.
1. The light touch and tone of the title? The alternate title of "Summer Madness" ? Its tone and theme? The original play was called "The Time of the Cuckoo”. The significance of this for the film's theme?
2. How central was Katharine Hepburn's performance for the strength of this film? How well did she carry the film and its impact?
3. The importance of Venice for the atmosphere? The use of colour, Jane as a photographer, as a tourist looking at Venice, its beauty and its puzzles? How different would the film have been in another European city?
4. How well did the film use the conventions of a heroine looking for romance, the romantic conventions of ‘man meets woman’, fall in love, happiness, disillusion? Did the film transcend its conventions?
5. How typical an American heroine was Jane? The joy of her arrival in Venice, her enthusiasm compared with the Englishman? Her taking photos? The nature of her chatter, of her visiting the tourist spots? The presentation of her loneliness, her work, her age? What was she looking for in terms of love and affection? How romantic were her expectations? How realistic? Was what happened to her inevitable?
6. The theme of the old world versus the new world, the innocent American abroad, naive and searching for romance, contrasting with the old world, its worldly wisdom and sophistication, using of the naive?
7. The moral questions raised in the film, Jane and her puritanical conscience, the irony of the Italian, law, Catholic conscience? What values did the film place on these moral approaches?
8. How attractive a character was Jane, the details of her life in Venice, in the pensione, the way she related to people? Her capacity for love, her following de Rossi, her lies, the infatuation, the puzzle? Her shock at discovering the truth? Her madness in not allowing it to influence her? The reason of her breaking off the romance? What effect on her would this episode in her life have? How was it ‘Summer Madness’?
9. Was de Rossi presented interestingly? The suave Italian, his appearances in the piazza, at the shop? His continually meeting her, his taking her on tours, away? What need did he have for love and affection? Was this explained well? The effect of the affair on him? 'The typical romantic Italian’?
10. What contribution did the Countess make to the film? Her welcoming of Jane, her style of life? Her relationship with Eddie and Jane's observation of this?
11. Eddie and Phyl? Jane's observation of their happiness, discovery of their unhappiness, Eddie's infidelity? Jane's attitude towards this?
12. The American tourists - the satire on American tourists, our laughing at the couple, yet Jane being similar? The farce of her falling into the canal?
13. Vito de Rossi as an instrument of Jane learning the truth?
14. How successful was the film in its dialogue, humour, individual sequences? Ordinary wisdom about a plain Jane?
