Love, European Style

I love getting good movie recommendations from friends- and boy did one of my bosses come up with a lu-lu!

My boss' office is decorated with some delightful framed lobby cards from a movie I was not familiar with- Two for the Road (1967). Audrey Hepburn and Albert Finney grin and kiss in what appears to be a romantic European road movie directed by Stanley Donen. And one look at the trailer reinforced that this would be a charming affair between a pair of silly lovebirds. Two is so much more than that.

As Two begins we see jaded couple Mark and Joanna (Finney and Hepburn) sniping at each other over the details of the next leg of their trip. Their gorgeous Mercedes pulls up to an airplane and they transfer their bags and their cigarettes to the main cabin. In between heated puffs on their ciggies (the cigarette girl/stewardess has more if they need them) the two continue to bicker sounding like they are on the verge of a divorce. Where did the two ooey-gooey in love people on the poster go? How did these two seemingly mismatched people get together in the first place? The flashbacks reveal all.

Throughout the rest of the film the action bounces back-and-forth between the couple's past and present and it's done in a non-linear fashion- juxtaposing incidents between different timeframes, and using matching shots of cars and match-on-action shots to flow so quickly between the past and the present that it takes a moment to realize that we've moved forward or back in time.

Mark and Joanna's lovestruck first trip hitchhiking in France quickly becomes the married couple driving through the countryside arguing about how little time Mark has for Joanna and their baby, and then back to newlyweds in a riotous shared roadtrip with another couple. It's seamless and fascinating in how it depicts the changes in the relationship without the use of a traditional timeline.

Whereas most romance films build linearly to tell the story of a marriage, Donen mixes all the moments (good and bad) up, simulating our actual memories- relying on the moment to determine what specific memory our minds go to. It is a technique that shows piecemeal the totality of emotions wrapped-up in this struggling marriage. The fragments of time fall into place until the puzzle that is this relationship is finished. It has a sense of immediacy and uncertainty- a detour from the tried and true Hollywood romance narrative.

Hepburn, in particular, has never felt more "in the moment" to me. She smiled, laughed, and goofed throughout her long career as the iconic gamine, but it often felt stiff and staged. There are moments here, too, where her lightheartedness seems forced- but for the most part, this older Hepburn seems more open and relaxed.

Perhaps that's because it's rumored she fell in love and had an affair with her co-star. One moment in particular where she looks at Finney contains such electricity and tenderness, it's easy to imagine that their film roles had slid into reality. Whatever the cause, Hepburn glows in Two and gets to wear some of the ill-est Sixties plastic couture.

Finney seems rather cold and not-as-charming- almost as if he was tired of re-creating his appealing ne'er-do-well Tom Jones (1963) character. But he looks great in a swimsuit and does a helluva Bogey impersonation. The scenes with William Daniels and Eleanor Bron as an anal, Freud-obsessed couple with a child-in-charge are priceless. Add an appearance by a young Jacqueline Bisset and a groovy soundtrack by Henry Mancini and you have a cinematic trip well worth taking.