BY LEE PFEIFFER
The niche market video label Code Red continues its distribution alliance with Kino Lorber, which is a very good thing for lovers of obscure retro movies. Case in point: "Story of a Woman", a 1970 drama that I will admit I was unaware of until receiving a review screener. The film is a truly international affair, shot in Europe by Italian director/writer/producer Leonardo Bercovici and starring two American male leads and Sweden's Bibi Andersson as the female protagonist. Andersson was making a name for herself in English-language cinema after having appeared in several of Ingmar Bergman classics. She plays Karin Ullman, an adventurous young Swedish woman who has left her home to study piano at a music conservatory in Rome in 1963. Here, she meets cute with Bruno Cardini (James Farantino), a hunky and charismatic medical student who has the good fortune of inadvertently causing a fender bender with Karin's car in one of the city's notorious traffic jams. All is immediately forgiven once Karin realizes she is hopelessly smitten with Bruno, and vice-versa. Soon, they are enjoying a Hollywood-like romance and Karin considers making their relationship permanent. That is, until she receives a visit from a middle-aged woman, Liliana (Annie Giradot), who explains she is Bruno's long-suffering wife. She says he has long been a serial philanderer and user of women. Liliana says he is now tired of suffering in silence. It seems Bruno is dependent upon her considerable wealth and she has given him an ultimatum: stop having affairs or lose your financial lifeline. Heartbroken and emotionally shattered, Karin leaves Rome to return to her parent's lake house on the outskirts of Stockholm. Here she finds her family and friends are able to provide her with solace. Things improve dramatically when she once again meets cute with a handsome man, this one American David Frasier. He's the polar opposite of Bruno: he's middle-aged and is the very definition of responsibility, as he is attached to the U.S. embassy in Rome as a high level diplomat. Soon, he and Karin progress from being lovers to a married couple. Life is fun and glamorous for Karin, as she attends parties with international dignitaries and the couple live a relatively high life style. Karin gives birth to a daughter and they move briefly to London where David has been assigned before returning to Rome. Here, things get messy when Bruno has a couple of coincidental meetings with her (seemingly unlikely given the vastness of the Eternal City.) Bruno explains what the viewer has already seen: he and Liliana had a terrible argument while in the car and a resulting accident cost Aliana her life. Bruno is now single and is regarded as one of Italy's top professional soccer players. In fact, he is a national idol. He comes across as repentant and sorry for the pain he previously caused Karin- but makes it clear he wants to resume their relationship. Karin prides herself on being a loyal wife and a good mother. She consistently rejects Bruno's advances...until she ultimately begins to weaken.
In the quaint vernacular of when "Story of a Woman" was made, it would probably have been referred to as "a woman's picture". There is no doubt it's a soap opera, but it's a surprisingly compelling one thanks to an engrossing script and interesting characters. The situation Karin finds herself in poses a question that many people have found it difficult to deal with: is it possible to learn to "unlove" someone from your past, even if you know that seeing them again is wrong in every logical respect? Karin begins to see Bruno to talk things out but David finds out and makes it clear that their marriage is on the verge of a breakdown. However, a darker side of Bruno begins to emerge, making Karin reevaluate her future.
The movie boasts some fine performances. Bibi Andersson is very good indeed as the woman caught in a love triangle. She sincerely loves both men in her life but realizes that once she married David, the honorable decision would be to remain loyal to him. However, her past with Bruno appeals the selfish aspects of every human being's personality. As her much-distressed and ever-tolerant husband, Robert Stack is excellent. Stack was generally relegated to bland characters in big screen dramas, probably because of his long-running role as the humorless Eliot Ness in "The Untouchables". Thus, it's good to see him playing a multi-faceted, interesting personality. The scene in which he loses his seemingly limitless tolerance for Karin's indecisiveness results in him having an emotional eruption. The scene provides a showcase for the finest acting I've seen from Stack, who would get a different kind of exposure for his comedic talents in "Airplane!" (1980). It should be mentioned that Stack and Andersson share a rather steamy love scene that is erotic, yet tasteful. It was fairly daring for two major stars at the time. Annie Giradot also makes an impact in her limited role as Bruno's long-suffering wife. Alas, James Farantino doesn't fare as well. He gives a perfectly fine performance but its undercut by director Bercovici's decision to have him play this Italian character without the slightest attempt to provide even a quasi-Italian accent. Thus, Farantino's Bruno sounds like he just dropped in from Kansas. As screenwriter, Bercovici could have solved the problem with a minor script rewrite in which Bruno would have explained he grew up in America and moved to Rome later in life. Instead, Farantino is able to look the part of an hunky native of Rome but every time he opens his mouth, it detracts from his performance.
The film features some lush locations, nicely photographed by Piero Portolupi and there's a fine romantic score provided by young up-and-comer John Williams. The Blu-ray presents an excellent transfer that helps reaffirm the film's somewhat exotic appeal. The only bonus feature is a trailer. "Story of a Woman" is undoubtedly sudsy in terms of the melodrama but its consistently engrossing throughout.
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