BOSSA NOVA
Reviewed by Harvey Karten Sony Pictures Classics Director: Bruno Barreto Writer: Alexandre Machado, Fernanda Young, novel "Miss Simpson" by Sergio Sant'Anna Cast: Amy Irving, Antonio Fagundes, Alexandre Borges, Debora Bloch, Drica Moraes, Giovanna Antonelli, Rogerio Cardoso, Sergio Loroza, Favio Sao Thiago, Alberto De Mendoza, Pedro Cardoso, Stephen Toboloswky, Kazuo Matsui
Contrary to the opinion of just about everyone in the 16-28 prime movie audience, people over 40 enjoy romance. When attachments are lacking, they may cover up their loneliness to themselves and the outside world, but rest assured that they need love in our lives like everyone else. Among the features that make "Bossa Nova" such a marvelous treat is that the principal characters are over 40, the amorous adventures of their youthful supporting actors communicating erotic charges considerably less than those of the leading personalities. Filmed by Bruno Barreto Rio, one of the world's most charming cities, "Bossa Nova" recalls that director's best known "Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands," made in 1978 and starring the sultry Sonia Braga as a woman torn between giving herself to her dead, irresponsible husband who returns regularly to earth or to the bore who has become her new spouse.
Though not as rich in fantasy as "Dona Flor," "Bossa Nova" departs occasionally from the roundelay of mistaken identities and fluctuating love affairs to take flight, as when leading man Antonio Fagundes in the role of Cariocan lawyer Pedro Paulo imagines herself dancing Fred-Astaire style with the woman who has caught him on the rebound, Mary Ann (Amy Irving--who is the real-life wife of the director).
Utilizing an adaptation of the novel "Miss Simpson" by Sergio Sant'Anna by screenwriters Alexandre Machado and Fernanda Young, director Barreto juggles a fine cast of actors in the diverse roles of people of various ages and cultures whose actions veer from the wacky to the tender, from bewildered to centered, as courtships cross lines feverishly under the hot sun of the Portuguese-speaking country.
At the heart of the story is a widowed American, Mary Ann (Amy Irving), a former air hostess whose pilot husband had drowned two years previously. Perhaps taking seriously the adage that a woman over 40 has as much chance for marriage as she has of winning the lottery, she has written romance out of her life as she teaches English to a boisterous lot of Rio's denizens in a well-appointed private language school. Her teaching brings her into contact with Nadine (Drica Moraes), a computer buff who has been enjoying a virtual romance with an American who calls himself Gary (Stephen Tobolowski)--allegedly a loft-living Soho artist with hair down to his waist. On one fortuitous day she shares an elevator with Pedro Paulo (Fagundes), who becomes smitten with her and signs up for one of her classes (though he already speaks English well). Pedro Paulo is on the rebound after his wife Tania (Debora Bloch) left him for a Japanese tai-chi instructor (Kazuo Matsui), but Pedro Paulo has competition from the brash soccer player, Acacio (Alexandre Borges), who has just been bought out by a British team.
When Acacio turns his attentions to Pedro Paulo's bright but mercenary legal intern Sharon (Giovanna Antonelli), Sharon must decide whether to shift her allegiance from the sweet fellow who has been courting her, Roberto (Pedro Cardoso), who is Pedro Paulo's half brother.
It's small world after all. As is typical in merry-go- roundelays, a group of strangers ultimately find that somehow they are all connected, and in the final scene, after some comical incidents of mistaken identity, all players get the mates whom they merit. A hospital room makes the madcap resolution a fitting conclusion to a romance that is more mature, more complex, and with more real atmosphere than the typical Hollywood production featuring bubbleheaded 20- somethings. Antonio Carlos Jobim's bossa nova soundtrack adds zip to the proceedings while the entire package serves as remarkable free advertising for the Government of Brazil Department of Tourism.
Rated R. Running Time: 95 minutes. (C) 2000 Harvey Karten, film_critic@compuserve.com
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