Identificazione Di Una Donna (aka Identification Of A Woman) (1982)

Recently divorced, a film director (Tomas Milian) enters a relationship with a young enigmatic aristocrat (Daniela Silverio) but he's warned by a mysterious stranger to leave her alone. After the aristocratic girl suddenly disappears, the director begins a relationship with a French actress (Christine Boisson). A late career entry by the great Michelangelo Antonioni (he would complete only one more feature length film), this is an interesting failure. Strikingly photographed by Carlo Di Palma (HANNAH AND HER SISTERS), the film is too derivative and vague, even on its director's own artistic terms, to be satisfying. The angst of Milian's film director and his troubling relationships with women conjure up Fellini's 8 1/2 and Silverio's out of the blue disappearance in the middle of the film recalls Lea Massari's disappearance in Antonioni's own L'AVVENTURA and there's even a pinch of Kubrick's 2001 at the very end. Then there's the film's insistent focus on a bird's nest in a tree but there's no payoff. Visually, the film's highlight is a superb sequence set on a fog enshrouded highway that's filled with portent but stylish as it is, it doesn't contribute to the narrative. It seems there just so Antonioni can show off. Still, I enjoyed it more than his THE PASSENGER or BLOW UP. The bland synthesizer score is by John Foxx.