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A nice idea but too rushed and half-baked to really pay off
NB - As is their wont, Amazon have unhelpfully bundled the reviews for the various different releases and formats of this film together. This review refers to Kino Lorber's US Blu-ray release.
Vittorio De Sica's Sunflower is one of those nice ideas for a love story that doesn't really pay off. Sophia Loren is the devoted wife who refuses to believe missing husband Marcello Mastroianni is dead on the Russian front after the end of the Second World War and determines to find him. Unfortunately the stars never really convince, playing almost parodic working class characters who are more mildly irritating than engaging - with his exaggerated nasal accent and her bad wig they just remind you of one of those couples who you end up constantly sharing a dinner table with on holiday despite all your best efforts not to. It's a slave to clichés - not one, but THREE railway station separations! - but despite the sizeable budget often feels too rushed and half-baked to allow many of them to work even as a production line tearjerker. There's even some surprisingly poor camerawork at times in the Italian scenes that makes you wonder if anybody was that bothered about the final result. A few moments stand out, like the cabin packed with soldiers sleeping on their feet in the Russian winter or a field of sunflowers that are the only marker for the graves of unknown soldiers and peasants, and the last half hour is fairly effective, but it doesn't add up to much.
This is another title that has had a troubled history on DVD, from a decent transfer as part of Lionsgate's US NTSC Sophia Loren 4-Film Collection [DVD] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC] to a dire public domain release from Jef Films. Kino Lorber's US DVD and region-free Blu-ray release is certainly the best of the bunch, with a good widescreen transfer in the original Italian with English subtitles, stills gallery and Italian trailer. That edition is also available as part of the Sophia Loren: Award Collection [Blu-ray] [US Import] with Boccaccio '70, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, Marriage Italian Style and feature-length documentary Vittorio D.
