Directed by Luca Guadagnino, staring Academy Award-winner Tilda Swinton, (Emma Recchi), Flavio Parenti (Edoardo Recchi) and Edoardo Gabbriellini (Antonio), ‘I Am Love’ is a powerful, passionate tale of a family’s most intimate secrets carefully hidden beneath a manicured bourgeois veneer. Set in Milan, Nice and London, the story revolves around Emma Recchi, the beautiful, aristocratic wife of a wealthy Milanese Tancredi Recchi (Pippo Delbono) and mother to their three children, now young adults.

The successful Recchi family is proud of their family business and comfortable with its generational privileges. The story begins with a formal family dinner at which the Recchi grandfather hands over the reigns of power, to be shared by his son Tancredi and his grandson, Edoardo. Tancredi is careful to restrain his consternation. Guadagnino uses beautiful camera techniques to carry the viewer into the heart of this elegant, traditional family home, establishing a deliberate and formal aesthetic. Emma is the touchstone of the family, the serene, gracious wife, obedient to the masters of her life. Enter the handsome, stranger, Antonio, who comes to the house bearing Edoardo a gift of atonement, a cake which he has created himself. This night will prove to be a turning point for this family.

Emma is Russian. Her colorful red, yellow, and blue silks, fashionable accessories, her engaging smile and soft, caressing manner belie a much deeper, inner passion. She is very close with her children but there are no sparks with her husband Tancredi.

Passion will not be denied, once ignited its power is dangerous, beautiful and unpredictable. The Recchi family is about to learn the power of this irrepressible passion once it is unleashed.

‘I Am Love’ is ultimately a defiant cry against the formality and decorum of the Recchi family legacy and its business, a compelling portrayal of the individual need to love and be loved. It is deserving of all its awards and 2009 Oscar nominations – a visually stunning foreign movie, with brilliant performances, sensuality, exquisite settings, rich textures and an intriguing music score by Pulitzer Prize winner John Adams (Shutter Island). Bravo!

-Moira Romano