& Gérard Brach
Amalfi, Salerno
& Cinecittà 1972
with Sydne Rome, Roman Polanski,
Hugh Griffith & Marcello Mastroianni
Though far from the least of his films, this is probably the one by Polanski that has been the least seen. Set mostly within a sun drenched villa on the Amalfi Coast, it recounts the adventures of a lovely young American who escapes there via a little gondola from some would be rapists on the road above. Though uninvited, her presence there isn’t questioned, and though little that happens there makes sense to her, she proves eminently adaptable to her surroundings. In her resilience and generosity of spirit, she is clearly both the subject and the object of Polanski’s considerable admiration, an embodiment in the character of Nancy and the person of the unexpectedly gifted Sydne Rome of the Spirit of Adventure and the Joy of Living. Perhaps recalling the happier and more entertaining memories of his life with Sharon Tate and their varied and perplexing circle of friends in Hollywood, it is, by far, the sunniest of his many fine pictures.
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