Under the Tuscan Sun – A Bookish Movie Review

Like so many book-based movies, Under the Tuscan Sun stole the title and some of the basics from the book, then threw everything else out the window. The movie was nothing like the book. Being a movie, the plot had to be all about romance and drama. The book was more about a return to a simple life and Frances was already seeing someone – a fact which didn’t even play a large role in the book. In some movies, these drives me slowly insane as I see how well they could have done the book. In this case, I can find it in me to forgive them since the book arguably had no plot to begin with. Something had to happen for this to be a good movie and for something to happen, they had to make things up.

That said, there really isn’t much more comparing to the book to do. Both were pretty good, fun and light and relaxing. The movie was a typical romantic comedy, perhaps still a little light on action even if significantly more happened than in the book. I felt like the creators of the movie were trying to make some point about love and life, but I didn’t really see what the moral was at the end of the movie. I enjoyed it though and would recommend it if you like romantic comedies and simply want to relax and be entertained. Just don’t read it because you liked the book or read the book because you liked the movie.