Proposed alternative title: The O.C. Italiano
Bored with network and Latino soap operas on the networks and Telemundo? Try one with Italian spice, because director Gabriele Muccino has packed enough soap bubbles into Remember Me, My Love to wash a dozen heavy loads.
Brightened mostly by the radiant presence of crossover star Monica Belluci, Remember follows the fracturing family life of the Ristuccias, with mom and pop drifting apart and into midlife crisis mode (he, an affair with old flame Belluci; she, reviving the acting dream she abandoned for marriage) while the offspring cope with teen-life crises (she, trying to parlay her hotness into a TV career; he, trying to shed his loser label with peers and his unrequited object d'amour).
Credit Muccino for keeping the screen hopping—this movie nearly gallops along, bouncing from one desperately disintegrating Ristuccia to the next, just long enough to advance their own story line. And on. And on. And on. All that's missing is those lingering reaction shots just before the commercials. And, of course, the commercials.
I'll spare you the details and simply summarize the action. Totaling up the quartet's quirks, we're witness to: infidelity, teen sex and masturbation, blowout arguments, bitterness, recriminations, accusations, separation, a horrible accident, a hospital crying scene, a shallow TV star, a woman's crush on a gay guy, a man telling his boss to screw off, inspirational recovery, tender reconciliation, weed, hash and a cute mutt. All soaked in operatic screaming, crying and gesticulating.
The cast make their characters as real as mannered stereotypes will allow, and Belluci is a graceful scene-stealer, but as "the other woman," she's shortchanged by a screenplay that trashes her dignity, turning her into a patsy.
Susan Lucci could parachute into the middle of Remember Me, My Love and the movie wouldn't miss one lip-quiver.