Break Up (1978)

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

Known also as "Break up" I prefer the original Italian title, "Eutanasia Di Un Amore", that lends this movie more individuality. Based on the definition of Merrian-Webster Dictionary, euthanasia is the act or practice of killing someone very ill or injured, in order to prevent any more suffering. Place the words "a love relationship" instead of "someone" and the meaning of this reflexive, melancholic and realistic movie looms very clearly for all to see. The story revolves around an university professor and writer in his early forties, Paolo (Tony Musante) and is loosely structured in three episodes: The sudden and apparently baseless act of departing of his young lover and ex student Sena (Ornella Muti) that leaves him utterly hurt and baffled. He tries all kind of strategic moves to see her again and talks her out of her resolution. This part ends with a voyage to Paris, to the Sorbone, where Sena is, seemingly having a new affair with a mustachioed young man. Paolo collapses completely and get sick. He suffers a painful lumbago and the doctor prescribes him sea baths. The second part is the key to the picture. Sena is back. She accompanies him to the sea shore and the love is rekindled. But the problem that it separated them appears with stark clarity (I will not reveal this point). Now, Paolo understands. He is a very reflexive man, an authentic professor trying to comprehend the emotional life of men and women from an intellectual point of view. He has a very dark view about the humanity, their deeds and the future of the world. Senna, also, is sympathetic with the views of Paolo but she feels that the woman in her, is speaking louder than his ideas inside her mind. She has been in love with him and also she has been in awe and dominated by his stature as a professor and his unquestioned arguments. But he has been blind to her needs, too sure of his intellectual superiority that he ignored the simple feelings of his lover, a younger person in a different stage of her life. And thus, she sees the rupture, inevitable. The third part encounters Paolo fighting against his despair but with lesser conviction than before, because, now he knows what is it all about. He roams by the sea, flirts with a beautiful and sensible girl (interpreted by the young and attractive Monica Guerritore) and finally accepts his destiny: he will continue living without Sena. Tony Musante was a very skillful and versatile actor who worked very well in the cinema, the TV and the stage. I remember him like a fearsome sociopath in The Incident (1967) and the next year, in The Detective starring Frank Sinatra. And, of course, I admired his acting in the short life TV series Toma. In this film he doesn't disappoint and performs with conviction the nuances of his educated character. Ornella Muti is wonderful. Her beauty is breathtaking and her intense personality doesn't need many words to express her feelings. Certainly, she is a girl to fight for and I love each time she is in front of the camera. Behind the camera, the final responsibility was assumed by Enrico Maria Salerno, a very well known actor with 120 credits in this capacity but with only 6 as a director (I consulted the IMDb). I like very much his work in this film. The mood, the locations, the way he handles the leading actors and the situations. Another asset is the music, aptly romantic and melancholic (I thank the composer Daniele Patucchi). Well, it's no secret that I value this relatively unknown and forgotten picture. I desire that in a near future, this situation changes and that we see "Eutanasia Di Un Amore" in a really worthy copy.

This is a still rather early movie for Ornella Muti, while she was on a good way to become a more serious actress, continuing soon after this little known movie with international box-office hits such as "Flash Gordon" and "Il bisbetico domato". Tony Musante, usually a better choice for a villain, plays Ornella's lover Paolo in a tragic romance which is dominated by the disagreement whether the couple should have children or not. The movie is well handled by veteran director Enrico Maria Salerno, if you take the opening for example when Sena (Ornella) refuses to talk to Paolo who becomes increasingly desperate.Yet again, this is just another movie about beautiful people who walk all day long on the beach or visit art exhibitions, contemplating the meaning of life, while they never seem to work for a living. Last not least, I want to mention there is a great part for Mario Scaccia as an eccentric doctor whose enthusiasm makes you believe in anything "the doctor ordered".