Screen & Sound · The Lori Diaries
I went on Netflix looking for a film. Preferably something pretty, comforting, and unlikely to make me question my entire approach to life. Tuscany seemed like a safe choice.
I found Under the Tuscan Sun, pressed play, and spent the next two hours wishing I were in Italy. I wanted the warm light, the winding roads, the long lunches, and a house with shutters that looked charming rather than like an expensive maintenance problem.
By the time the credits rolled, though, the scenery wasn't what I was thinking about.
I was thinking about how often we imagine happiness arriving in a very specific form. A relationship. A job. A home. A version of ourselves who has finally sorted everything out and, presumably, never sends an embarrassing text again.
And what happens when life gives us something else?
First, the Villa. Then, the Existential Questions.
In the film, Frances Mayes, played by Diane Lane, is a writer trying to find her footing after a painful divorce. Her friend Patti, played by Sandra Oh, gives her a trip to Italy. Frances goes, sees a crumbling villa in Tuscany, and makes the sort of impulsive real-estate decision that would have me calling three people, checking my bank account six times, and then deciding to sleep on it.
She buys it.
The villa is called Bramasole. It needs serious work, and so, understandably, does Frances's confidence in what her future is supposed to look like.
There's something irresistible about this premise. One disastrous chapter ends, and suddenly there are sun-drenched hills, fresh pasta, and the possibility of becoming someone new.
Of course, this is cinema. Most of us can't respond to heartbreak by purchasing a house in Italy. Some of us are still negotiating with our landlords over a dripping tap.
But I don't think the villa is really the point.
She Buys a House for a Life She Doesn't Have Yet
What stayed with me is that Frances doesn't just want somewhere to live. She wants a home filled with people. She imagines a wedding there. A family. Meals around a table. The kind of life that feels a long way off when you're standing in an unfamiliar country with a broken marriage behind you.
She can picture the future, but she has no idea how she'll get there.
That feels familiar, even without the Italian property.
How many times have we told ourselves that we'll start living properly when something happens? When we meet the right person. When we get the promotion. When we move. When we feel confident enough. When the timing is perfect.
I'm very good at the imaginary version of things. In my head, I can plan a beautiful life in astonishing detail. It's the part where real life refuses to follow the itinerary that gets complicated.
Frances doesn't have a guarantee that the life she wants will turn up. She starts making room for it anyway.
Maybe you don't have to wait until your life looks the way you imagined it before you start making it a life you enjoy.
That's the part I wanted to take home with me. Not the villa, although I certainly wouldn't refuse it. The willingness to begin before all the answers arrive.
What If the Love Story Isn't Just About Romance?
Naturally, there is an attractive Italian man. His name is Marcello, he's played by Raoul Bova, and I would be lying if I said I found this part of the film difficult to watch.
But the romance isn't what makes Frances's new life meaningful. And that's what I liked most.
There's Patti, who knows her well enough to send her away when she needs a change of scenery. There's Katherine, gloriously committed to making an entrance. There are neighbours, workers, unexpected friendships, and people whose lives begin to overlap with Frances's in ways she couldn't have planned.
Somewhere between the renovations, the dinners, and the people who start turning up at her door, her house becomes a home.
I think we sometimes talk about a happy ending as though it arrives holding hands with one person. And don't get me wrong, I love a good romance. I am fully capable of rooting for a couple who have exchanged approximately four meaningful glances.
But friendship is love, too. So is being welcomed somewhere. So is having people who remember you, show up for you, and know how you take your coffee.
Romance can be part of a wonderful life without being the only proof that you've built one.
A Small Spoiler, and the Part That Got Me
If you haven't seen the film and want to know nothing about its ending, this is your cue to watch it first.
Frances's wishes for the house do come true. There's a wedding at Bramasole. There's a family gathered there. Just not in the way she originally imagined.
She hasn't followed a neat little plan and collected every milestone in the correct order. She's helped create a place where other people's lives can unfold alongside her own.
And when Signor Martini helps her recognize that, it turns the whole story around.
Frances was so focused on the life she thought she was waiting for that she almost missed the one she had already built.
That thought made me emotional in a way I wasn't expecting from a film I'd chosen mainly because it looked like a holiday.
It also made me think about the things I might overlook while waiting for something bigger. A conversation that makes an ordinary evening. A friendship that's become a second home. A small project I started just because I loved it. An afternoon that doesn't look impressive online but feels lovely while I'm living it.
Those things aren't placeholders until my “real” life begins.
They are my life.
No, I'm Not Booking a One-Way Ticket to Tuscany. Yet.
I know Under the Tuscan Sun is a fantasy. The renovation is photogenic, the countryside looks permanently ready for a postcard, and Diane Lane makes starting over appear considerably more glamorous than it tends to feel on an ordinary Tuesday.
I also know a change of scenery doesn't magically solve everything. You can bring your worries to Italy just as easily as you can bring your suitcase.
Still, there's something comforting about a film that lets a woman want more from life without insisting she must find the perfect man before she's allowed to enjoy it.
It reminded me a little of Eat Pray Love, another story I have a soft spot for. Not because I believe we all need to leave our lives behind and embark on an expensive journey of self-discovery, but because I understand the temptation. Sometimes a different place makes it easier to imagine a different possibility.
The useful part is remembering that you can carry that possibility home.
So yes, Netflix took me to Tuscany for an evening. I admired the houses, fell a little in love with the scenery, and briefly considered how difficult it would be to learn Italian.
But what I brought back from the film had very little to do with travel.
I don't know exactly what my future will look like. I have ideas, of course. A few dreams. An unreasonable number of imaginary scenarios. Some of them involve love. Some involve places I want to see, things I want to write, and people I hope will be sitting around my table.
I'd still like those things. I'm just trying not to treat everything happening before them as a waiting room.
Maybe the happy ending isn't always getting the life you pictured. Maybe it's looking around one day and realizing there's already so much to love about the life you made along the way.
Watch the trailer
Have you seen Under the Tuscan Sun? And do you have a comfort film that unexpectedly made you rethink something about your own life?
xoxo,
Lori
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