[Update] 04/12/2012

Woody Allen's 'To Rome With Love' to Open Los Angeles Film Festival
10:38 AM PDT 4/12/2012 by Rebecca Ford

The festival, now in its 18th year, runs June 14 through June 24.

Woody Allen’s To Rome With Love will open the Los Angeles Film Festival, festival organizers announced Thursday. The Oscar-winning filmmaker’s latest project, starring Allen, Alec Baldwin, Roberto Benigni, Penélope Cruz, Judy Davis, Jesse Eisenberg, Greta Gerwig and Ellen Page, follows a group of people living in Italy.

"I can’t think of a better way to kick off this year’s festival than with the original independent filmmaker himself, Woody Allen. It’s a true honor for Los Angeles to host the North American premiere of To Rome With Love,” said festival director Stephanie Allain.

The 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival, held June 14 through June 24, will screen a slate of over 200 feature films, shorts, and music videos, representing more than 30 countries. Now in its 18th year, the festival, produced by Film Independent, the non-profit arts organization that also produces the Spirit Awards, is based in downtown Los Angeles, with its central hub at L.A. LIVE.

To Rome With Love, Allen’s follow up to Midnight in Paris, will be released by Sony Pictures Classic on June 22. The movie was produced by Letty Aronson and Stephen Tenenbaum and financed by Italian production and distribution company Medusa Film.

Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com

[Update] 04/16/2012 - 10:17 am

[Update] 04/17/2012 - 10:46 am

[Update] 04/19/2012 - 10:02 am

[Update] 04/20/2012 - 10:24 am

Italian Critics Don't 'Love' Allen's Roman Holiday
by Sylvia Poggioli - April 20, 2012

After shooting in London, Barcelona and Paris, Woody Allen made his latest European backdrop Rome. To Rome With Love opens Friday in Italy — in Italian.

The movie is a magnificent postcard of the eternal city — a carefree romp along cobblestone streets nestled between ancient ruins and Renaissance palaces. A soft yellow glow pervades every scene. It projects an image of the sweet life with all the charms under the Italian sun, set to the tune of old standbys like "Volare" and "Arrivederci Roma."

Allen has said he grew up watching Italian cinema and was influenced by its grand masters. While there's nothing neorealist in his latest movie, it has an echo of Fellini's The White Sheik, and Penelope Cruz's performance in one segment calls to mind Sofia Loren's high-end call girl in Vittorio de Sica's Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.

The movie is made up of four separate vignettes about love swaps, mistaken identities and the cult of celebrity. One features Woody Allen himself playing a retired, neurotic opera director who tries to make a star out of a man who can sing Pavarotti-quality opera, but only in his shower.

In another episode, Alec Baldwin plays a famous architect vacationing in Rome, reminiscing about his youth in the city. Along the way, he meets a young American student, played by Jesse Eisenberg, who is love-struck by Ellen Page, playing a narcissistic young actress.

Italy's Oscar-winning comedian Roberto Benigni plays a Mister Nobody who suddenly and mysteriously becomes a celebrity. He's hounded by paparazzi and TV crews, and courted by glamorous women. Just as suddenly, he returns to being Mister Nobody — but seems deranged by his loss of visibility. It's a reference, perhaps, to the power of television in the country where a media tycoon like Silvio Berlusconi can become prime minister.

The Italian critics had no love for To Rome With Love. Woody Allen is a cult figure here, but reviews of his newest movie were lukewarm — nowhere near the charm, critics said, of last year's Midnight in Paris. Critics called the movie superficial, banal and full of stereotypes, and said it lacks the irony and scathing satire present in most Italian postwar cinema.

Several complained that Allen's Rome is the one foreigners have in their mind's eye even before setting foot here. And it's a vision filtered through the prism of the 1 percent — the characters lodge in grandiose baroque-style rooms in five-star hotels and enjoy grand vistas from terraces the average Roman can only dream about.

Paolo d'Agostini of La Repubblica quipped, "Can you imagine a Roman traffic cop living in an apartment overlooking the Spanish Steps?"

To Rome With Love opens in the U.S. — in English — in June.

Source: http://www.npr.org

Ellen Page Calls Working With Woody Allen 'Trippy'
'It's a very dreamlike feeling,' 'To Rome With Love' actress tells MTV News.
By Fallon Prinzivalli | April 20, 2012 9:58 AM EDT

Ellen Page has come a long way from the girl whose wit stole our hearts in "Juno." From the psychological thriller "Peacock" — about a man who can't seem to control his alter ego, Emma — to the sci-fi blockbuster hit "Inception," she's taken on an array of roles that prove her acting talent. In the upcoming Woody Allen film "To Rome With Love," we'll get to see Page assume another character that strays widely from her usual lovable disposition as she seduces her friend's boyfriend.

The movie follows four separate stories, all taking place in Rome, Italy. When Monica (Page) jets off to the Eternal City after breaking up with her boyfriend, she begins a romance with her best friend Monica's (Greta Gerwig) guy, Jack (Jesse Eisenberg). When MTV News spoke with the actress recently, she told us what it was like to work with the ensemble cast, what she found challenging about the role and what's next in her career.

MTV: What lead you to choose this script?

Ellen Page: Well, you know, Woody Allen wrote it, so that has nothing to do with it. [Laughs.] And also, it was just a role and a character that I had not done before — at all — so it was exciting and challenging and nerve-wracking, and all those things which are really nice to feel.

MTV: What else attracted you to that role?

Page: I guess, probably just exploring something that was so far removed from myself. Like, I was confused as to why Woody wanted me to do it, you know? It scared me and I think it was about figuring out how to be able to feel comfortable in that and do something new.

MTV: Was that what you found challenging about the part?

Page: I don't know about comfortability, but maybe believing it. You know, like you yourself and hoping that others will too. And it's challenging because it's confusing. When you're doing something that's for a vignette, you have limited time. It's not like you are going in depth with this strenuous arc of a character. So in some ways that makes it more difficult or more confusing.

MTV: You mentioned Woody Allen. He wrote, directs and stars in the film. What was it like working with him?

Page: Trippy. I feel like that would be the best way to put that. It's a hard thing to really wrap your head around when it's happening — to be standing on the golden, sunlit streets of Rome with Jesse, who's so wonderful and such a talented actor. And then [there's] Woody Allen walking up to you to give you direction. It's a very dreamlike feeling. I sort of forget that it even happened. It's weird.

MTV: What was it like acting opposite Alec Baldwin and Jesse Eisenberg?

Page: They're both awesome, and Greta Gerwig as well. We had such a great time together and Jesse is so kind and so down-to-earth. Alec and Greta as well. Just three lovely people to spend every day with all day. I had a really nice time getting to know Alec. I've been such a huge fan of his for so long and I think he's wonderful.

MTV: The film takes on a similar story structure to "Paris, Je T'aime" and "New York, I Love You." Both movies follow separate story lines that don't always connect to one another. Do you think comparisons to the film would be fair?

Page: Well, not particularly, because "Paris Je T'aime" is [comprised of] distinct short films with different directors. I feel like this is different because you have the very distinctive Woody Allen voice. And you have these four scenes that are separate, but ultimately there are themes in the film. It's the invisible things that string it all together. But I wouldn't say that it's comparable to those [films] only because it's not like each vignette is a separate, isolated short film from another person's creative endeavor. It's all one person.

MTV: You recently voiced the character of Lindsey on "Family Guy." You've done voice acting in the past for "The Simpsons." Do you find that more difficult than being in front of the camera?

Page: No, I really love it, actually. I wish I could do more, because you kind of have to overdo everything, obviously, because you're not being seen and it's [only] your voice. That's actually really fun. In my job, it's about making things quiet, I guess. But that's really fun and you get to go in the [studio] and wear whatever you want. It's kind of like my dream job. [Laughs.]

MTV: What's next up for you? We heard "The East" with Alexander Skarsgård is set to release this year.

Page: Yeah, I think that should be coming out this fall. I'm super-excited about "The East." It's going to be really interesting. I'm super-pumped for that movie. [My character] is probably one of the most emotionally and physically exhausting roles, in the best way. It was such a dream role for me that just abruptly popped up in my life. [It] was just so much fun.

MTV: Is there any type of role you're dying to play? Or a particular actor or director you'd love to work with?

Page: I mean, god, that's hard. If I started to name actors and directors I'd love to work with, I wouldn't stop. I just think so many people are incredible [and] when it comes to specific roles, that's always hard to say. I always want to do something that just speaks to me and where I'm at with my life, and something that feels honest and different.

Source: http://www.mtv.com

Vogue Italia Review - To Rome with Love
Woody Allen's new movie dedicated To Rome with Love: four postcard that, despite the director's stroke of genius, are not completely convincing
by Francesca Felletti, published on 04/19/2012

From its opening credits, the film that Woody Allen has created about the Eternal City – To Rome with Love – is like a postcard, one with sundrenched panoramas over rooftops, imposing shots of ruins and picturesque views. But it’s a split-screen postcard with four vignettes set in a superficial Decameron-esque setting: a policeman stops the traffic in Piazza Venezia to tell the audience about some of the human stories that have taken place in the Italian capital. The first postcard is the best.

It starts with a love affair between a female tourist from New York and a Roman, set – as you might expect – amid the Spanish Steps and the Trevi Fountain. Then her parents arrive in preparation for the coming wedding. But when the father of the bride (Woody Allen), a formal music impresario, hears the father of his daughter’s intended sing in the shower, he decides to make an opera singer of him. The problem is that outside the bathroom the man loses his vocal ability and so Allen ends up staging I Pagliacci with Canio on the stage behind a transparent shower.

The second postcard involves a famous architect (Alec Baldwin). As a young man, he lived for a time in Rome in Via dei Panieri, and it’s there he meets a young university student (Jesse Eisenberg) who is also living in Trastevere. Baldwin follows his romantic adventures with some nostalgia: the boy falls in love with his girlfriend’s best friend (Ellen Page, the star of Juno, who plays here a flighty starlet who pretends to be more cultured than she is). The setting for the story including the Terme Deciane at night, the romantic lake at Villa Borghese and Trajan’s Markets in the rain, with visits to the Auditorium and Ostia.

The third vignette is the least successful. A very ordinary man (Roberto Benigni) leaves home one day in the Garbatella and suddenly, for no reason at all, becomes a celebrity. He’s invited onto TV news for trivial interviews, he’s stopped by people in the street, he gets invitations to film premieres at Cinema Moderna in Piazza della Repubblica and fashion shows at the Ara Pacis. Just as suddenly though, he loses his fame to another unknown and sinks into depression, leading him to improvise a striptease in Via Veneto in the hope of attracting the attention of passers-by. It’s a missed opportunity for a satire on fame and the media.

The last story, like the others, brings together a mixture of Woody Allen’s ideas and obsessions, which are fun but not particularly original. Two seemingly naive newly-weds have just arrived at the city’s station to stay at the Hotel dei Principi in Via Frescobaldi. They both become ensnared, the man by Penelope Cruz, once again playing a prostitute, and the woman – as in Federico Fellini’s The White Sheik – by a film star (Antonio Albanese). As a backdrop, we have the Piazza del Popolo, where the new bride (Alessandra Mastronardi) gets lost, and Piazza Mattei, where she meets a film crew. There’s also an elegant villa with a garden on the Via Appia and the Vatican Museums, where the groom (Alessandro Tiberi) is taken on a visit by welcoming Roman relations.

The photography is slipshod, but as in all Woody Allen’s films, his skill and cunning create moments of genius. They’re enough for you not to be left with the impression that you’ve wasted an hour and a half sitting in the dark in a cinema.

Source: http://www.vogue.it

Woody Allen: love from Paris to Rome
by Camillo de Marco, published on April 13, 2012

It's not far from Paris to Rome. For Woody Allen, "the most European of American film directors" having been brought up on French and Italian films, it seemed only natural to give tribute to the Eternal City after the City of Light (with Midnight in Paris). Perhaps it was only Rome’s turn, especially after London was the backdrop for his trilogy on guilt and punishment, and Spain inspired Vicky Cristina Barcelona. Allen has however rejected rumours that other European cities would follow. There will be no Beautiful People in Copenhagen, as his next film will be shot in New York and San Francisco.

It was clear that Allen would use the Colyseum as the backdrop to a new love story from the moment that he announced the first title of his latest film,Bop Decameron. The film is indeed a sort of compilation of stories laced with Boccaccian erotism on a be-bop rhythm, with rapid sequences, improvisations, and harmonic constructions.

Whether Boccaccio or Pier Paolo Pasolini would have liked it, To Rome With Love (the film’s final title) is not only about love and betrayal, but also displays a great lightness, that evokes in turn Sigmund Freud, the vanity of Hollywood actors, fame born from nothing, the mass media system, and show business. Rome, here in light brown tones, becomes the symbolic setting for malicious, capricous, and sometimes cynical, twists in the plot.

Cynical and disenchanted is exactly what great architect John appears to be in the episode that brings together the stars Alec Baldwin, Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network) and Ellen Page (Juno, Inception). John (Baldwin), back in Rome for the holidays, where he lived for a while during his youth, becomes the voice of young architecture student Jack (Eisenberg)’s conscience. The latter is in love with a friend of his fiancée, Monica (Page), a young unemployed actress who hides an incredibly vacuous interior under her sensitive and romantic exterior. Woody Allen himself plays an embittered retired opera director in Rome to meet his daughter’s boyfriend, accompanied by his wife (Judy Davis) who has a Freudian intrpretation for everything. When he discovers that the fiancé’s father (Fabio Armiliato) has an incredible voice, overhearing him singing in the shower, he throws himself into a formidable mise-en-scene of the opera Pagliacci.

The film’s other episodes feature a parade of Italian actors. One episode shows a young couple from the North (Alessandro Tiberi and Alessandra Mastronardi) whose relationship has been shattered by a young high-class prostitute (Penélope Cruz) and a film star and great charmer (Antonio Albanese). As for Roberto Benigni, he plays Leopoldo Pisanelli, Rome’s most normal and boring man until he wakes up one morning to discover that he has become famous, and he is followed around by a hord of paparazzis, escort girls, and television journalists asking him what he ate for breakfast.

While Midnight in Paris was carried by a powerful idea, that of making an author with writer’s block meet authors and artists from the past, To Rome With Love is a little uniform and homogenous, despite a few great moments, and Rome’s beauty is not quite enough to hide its clichés.

Source: http://www.cineuropa.org