A Disappointing Continuation

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

for me, this film has only two virtues . the first - Alain Delon who is the perfect baron de Charlus. the second - the conviction than only Luchino Visconti could be able to direct Proust masterpiece. it is unfair to say that it is a bad film. it is only a decent try . in which the lead actors are uncomfortable in the clothes of the roles. because, at the first sigh, all is correct. performances, atmosphere, the adaptation. but something is missing. the flavor of the universe of Marcel, the poetry of the lines of paper, the nuances, the delicacy, maybe the nostalgia . it is an exercise. admirable. but not exactly convincing.

strange construction. remarkable recreation of atmosphere, few drops of Proust novel -as discreet homage - a nice Charlus, a voluptuous Odette and correct Swann. details of a world in who mannerism is part of fall. good acting, interesting description of obsession, seductive tale about life style of aristocracy levels. and if you do not read the confession of Marcel, all is OK. but in case of error, the taste is not good. a slice of perfect universe remains a slice. the good intentions are far to be steps of adaptation. the flavor is present, the voices are at perfect place, the images are parts from the cake but result is a poor drawing. sure, it is an exercise." A la recherche de temps perdu" is out of any adaptation. but important is the fact than it is not a really disappointing film. that is the key.

A section of Marcel Proust's supposedly unfilmable novel, "Rememberances of Things Past", is filmed by German director Volker Shlondorff in "Swann in Love".Actor Jeremy Irons plays our titular hero (Charles Swann), a nineteenth-century gentleman whose Jewishness irks the Parisian elite. What can they do to remove him from their ranks? More importantly, how can they get rid of him without getting their hands dirty? Many works of art have dealt with Jewish outsiders, but few turn antisemitism into such a shrewd game of cloak and daggers. The social circles Swann frequents don't just want to kick him out, they want Swann to kick himself out. To condemn himself. Only in this way will their preserve their own chasteness.Of course Swann's downfall soon comes. He becomes infatuated with Odette de Crecy, a manipulative woman who seduces Swann into marriage. She just wants his money. He just wants to conquer her and add her to his treasure chest of arts and riches. When they are married, and Odette's sordid past is revealed, Swann's enemies finally have the pretext for ostracising him. By the film's end, Swann has lost everything – money, fame, power, status, wife – and becomes yet another victim to human folly.The film's cast is fine (particularly Irons, Alain Delon and Ornella Muti as Odette), but Shlondorff isn't strong enough a visualist to tease out their passions or fully milk his tale's tragedy. Some visuals work tremendously – opera stages used to highlight the faux-graciousness and play-acting of society's upper echelons, and a few sensitive fantasy sequences – but similar tales have been better told elsewhere.7.9/10 – Worth one viewing. For a more zany take on this material, see "Phantom of the Paradise". See too Slondorff's "Ogre" and "The Ninth Day".

According to IMDB this seems to have been the first time anyone ever tried to adapt Proust to the movies. And though flawed, it's not a bad try--kind of languid, but that was probably deliberate. Jeremy Irons is one of the best at portraying repressed longing, and Ornella Muti is exquisite enough to explain Swann's amour fou.