The Great Beauty - a love letter to modern-day Rome

TO try to decode the true meaning of The Great Beauty would be an irreversible mistake. To simply go ahead and feel The Great Beauty opens a door to many lavish, lasting pleasures.

Italian actor Sabrina Ferilli, as Ramona, in a scene from Italian director Paolo Sorrentino's "La grande bellezz...

THE GREAT BEAUTY [MA15+]

Rating: 4 stars

Director: Paolo Sorrentino (Il Divo)

Starring: Toni Servillo, Carlo Verdone, Sabrina Ferilli

To try to decode the true meaning of The Great Beauty would be an irreversible mistake. To simply go ahead and feel The Great Beauty opens a door to many lavish, lasting pleasures.

Best described as a love letter to modern-dayRome and its time-honoured track record of excess, this arrestingly opulent production is a hot fave to win the next Best Foreign Language Film Oscar.

Strolling aimlessly through the passing parade of prettiness staged hereis ageing Italian author Jep Gambardella (Toni Servillo). Though he hasn't written anything of note in almost 40 years, Jep has still been busy in that certain way only the idle rich can.

There have been women. Many women. A lot of great friends (one of whom might be the next Pope). Many more strange acquaintances (plenty of whom can be spotted at the over-the-top birthday party sequence). opening which opens the movie).

And then there is Rome. Always Rome.

While it has long always been Jep's personal playground, he comes to see it through fresh eyes when the recollection of a cherished memory triggers an impromptu tour of "The Eternal City". The spirit of Fellini's immortal masterpiece La Dolce Vita pulses away strongly in the best scenes of The Great Beauty.

Though some viewers will be frustrated by the lack of any direct story to connect with, most will forgive the oversight in gratitude for the overdose of pure splendour on offer.