"Up At The Villa" is a rather usual romantic tale, only set ages ago in Italy, where Mary Panton(Kirsten Scott Thomas) has just left her husband who was a bit of a drunk to put matters lightly. She stays in a villa with her wealthy friends (including Anne Bancroft) and finds that a wealthy gentleman named Edgar Swift(James Fox) has come from Cannes to propose marriage.

During her stay, she falls for an American who's a bit of a rebel(Sean Penn), and in comes the regular story of watching our lead actress struggle with conflicting emotions about the people around her. Thankfully, unlike the recent film "End Of The Affair", the actors have not restrained their performances; Scott-Thomas offers her usual subtle gestures, but Penn easily crafts an engaging performance that carries the film along.

Although not becoming slow enough to be painful or tedious, I didn't really find a compelling enough reason to follow the film for its 115 minute running time. There may be a spark and some minor chemistry between the leads, but there certainly isn't enough to really take the picture along. It ends up being a pretty minor tale stretched out beyond its limits. The movie ends up being one of those period pieces where it's certainly very pretty to look at with beautiful locations and cinematography, but there's not enough going on or enough material for the actors to really create much energy or interest in the events.

The DVD

VIDEO: Aside from one strange, short problem, the presentation from USA Films for "Up At The Villa" is not perfect, but overall better than their previous two releases ("Waking the Dead" and "Joe Gould's Secret") which didn't quite fare as well in this department. As with many period pictures, there is a bit of an intentionally "soft" look to the movie, but this really isn't overused or distracting. Detail is a tad above average, and clarity is fine except for some of the darker scenes, which look a bit murky.

The strange problem was, again, a very minor and quick one. At about 17 minutes and 53 seconds into the movie, the picture noticably flickered for a second or two - this happened again (also only for a second or two) a few seconds later. This happened again when I played the sequence again. A weird problem. Aside from that, I didn't notice any instances of pixelation. There are some brief, small amounts of shimmering and light marks on the print used, but these remain minor.

Not too bad, but I hope that USA Films can improve their DVD output in the future. The layer change is at 1:00:20.

SOUND: The film's Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack is a pretty basic affair, with only some slight uses of the surrounds for ambient sounds and a couple of light effects, but these are not very effective. The musical score sounds particularly good, filling the room with warm and clear audio. Dialogue is also natural and enjoyable, sounding crisp and easily understood. About what one would expect from the audio of a period drama.

MENUS: Menus are non-animated, with very basic images serving as backgrounds.

EXTRAS: Not a whole lot - trailer and cast/crew bios.

Final Thoughts: Those who enjoy the genre or are fans of the actors might like the film as a rental, but the DVD in terms of audio/video/extras is nothing special.