The jet set in the Italian capital needs no lessons in excess. It’s Jep’sbirthday and everyone is celebrating. All inhibitions are immediately lost inthe first minutes of this baroque film. A pumping remix of Raffaella Carrà andher ‘A far l’amore comincia tu’ blasts from the speakers. The guests areraging, the filth is slumbering, though it’s all yet to begin. There’s Jep atlast, grinning broadly and wearing a suit, as if that makes him a decent man.A film like an exquisite party: you have to experience it.
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2 The great Gatsby
No character is as mysterious and mythical as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s JayGatsby, whether Robert Redford plays him or Leonardo DiCaprio. His lavishparties are no less. It’s the roaring twenties. Even those who walked casuallyback then still wore a suit. Or so it seems. Women decked out in glitterydresses and hats, which were as often modest as they were ostentatious.Everything breathes glamor at such a Gatsby party. Whoever meant something wasthere. Or did you just mean something because you were there?
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3. Il gattopardo
The Sicilian aristocracy falls in the 1960s, while the bourgeoisie is justemerging. A pompous ball is then indispensable in this chronicle of the deathof a class. Burt Lancaster has to make do with a last circle dance as ametaphor for life passing by. Verdi’s music does the rest. Festive grandeurwith a mourning edge, because you can’t resist change.
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4. Breakfast at Tiffany ‘s
The emptier the lives on the silver screen, the more dressed up people are.People drink expensive drinks, sell cheap talk and hope that the semblance ofan important existence will be preserved. The viewer is most entertained.Audrey Hepburn embodies that fathomless emptiness like no other in her iconicblack dress – designed by Givenchy. Her flat is a hotspot for parties where aJan Modaal wouldn’t feel relaxed for a moment. Neither does a cat, by the way. Look at Play Google
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5. Pride & Prejudice
A dance is never optional, and it certainly wasn’t in the early 19th centuryof Jane Austen’s filmed novel. Outfits say everything about your origin, yourplace in the world. Back then, parties were still modest and classy. As ifinhibitions also offered security. To a steadfast life of loving and beingloved. No wonder that passion had to speak mainly from looks that wereexchanged. Between Elizabeth Bennet and her Mr. Darcy, for example.
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6. A single male
George and Charley have no one and each other in a film that is so beautifulthat it could only have been made by a designer like Tom Ford. Which is alsonoticeable in the outfits. They are dazzling. When he is her guest, he pourshimself a glass while she puts Etta James on. They dance, intimately, untilthe darkness again becomes too suffocating for her. ‘Wait!’ Booker T & TheMG’s goes on. “Come on, old man!” They go wild in style. They still lookgraceful, and for a moment they seem happy too.
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7. The party
In a place where no one really feels at home, the biggest crazies soon seemnormal. The party appeals to the imagination, not because of the disdain ofthe guests, but because of the way the inhibitions drop when things go off therails. A house full of foam and an elephant that blends into the crowd: alletiquette is gone. Even Peter Sellers, here with the questionable appearanceof a man from India, can’t compete with that. Life as it is: Hollywood.
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8. Malcolm & Mary
Partying is also: coming home and not ready for a night’s sleep yet. Just keepgoing, with your dress shoes and tuxedo. Perhaps as you did not dare to dobefore. Although Malcolm isn’t that type now. He presented his first film thatevening, but there is a storm in the air at home. He doesn’t see it, dances toJames Brown. Confident, or no: smug. One feels discomfort with an overlyemphatic outfit, the other feels taller.