Movie review: 'Bread and Tulips': Mostly about love Movie review: 'Bread and Tulips': Mostly about love (October 03, 2001)

By Ramin Setoodeh

"Bread and Tulips," now playing at the Guild Theatre in Menlo Park, is a sweet, sensible love story, set in Italy with wonderful backdrops and an even more wonderful cast.

I'm sure the plot must have looked contrived on paper _ loaded with goofy characters that bounce off the screen like ping pong balls. But the dialogue (in Italian with English subtitles) is rich and the tone feels just right. Here is a movie that feels comfortable in its own skin.

"Love is more important than beauty," says a tour guide at the beginning of the film. He is right. Consider the movie's heroine, Rosalba (Licia Maglietta), who is certainly not beautiful by conventional American standards.

And yet, look at her. She has an on-screen presence that transcends beauty. She is alive and approachable; the camera swallows her. That's genuine star power.

Rosalba is an unappreciated mother and housewife, ignored by her husband and two teenage sons. She is so unappreciated, in fact, that no one notices when she doesn't re-board the bus after a pit stop on a family vacation. Rosalba spends too much time in the bathroom, trying to fish an earring out of the toilet. When she comes out to look for the bus, she realizes that it's gone.

This early scene is merely a plot device to separate Rosalba from her family. She decides to hitchhike home, and then changes her mind and decides to go to Venice instead.

While there, she lodges with an amiable waiter (Bruno Ganz), finds work with a florist (Felice Andreasi) and befriends a masseuse (Marina Massironi). Rosalba and the waiter grow closer together, until they _ yes _ fall in love.

Meanwhile, back at home, Rosalba's husband (Antonio Catania) is miserable because the house is a mess and no one is there to prepare the meals. "Can you iron a few shirts?" he asks his mistress.

"Are you crazy," she says, "I'm your mistress, not you're wife."

And so, he hires a plumber named Costantino (Giuseppe Battiston) to track down his wife. Why a plumber? Because he cannot afford a detective, and Costantino has read more than 200 detective novels _ which he figures is close enough.

These are all the right elements for a charming, romantic comedy, and "Bread and Tulips" does not let us down. The performances are not quirky, but warm and inviting.

American romantic comedies usually fail because the stars are more concerned about their egos than about the material. But "Bread and Tulips" sets the perfect mood, and carries us through the story line as if we were dancing on clouds.

This is not a fairly tale; and yet, the characters are so pleasant that they infect the screen with a sense of magic.

Perhaps, in retrospect, the ending could have been more original. Instead, it takes the easy and conventional route. But I am not sure that matters.

Ms. Maglietta is wonderful to watch. She has a lot of fun with the material. And she has great on-screen chemistry with Mr. Ganz.

"Bread and Tulips" knows that movies about love are more about love than about anything else. And I left the theater smiling.

Now that's important.