Summer Lovers (1982)

Eighteen years ago...

I rented this one because I noticed a facebook post by Teresa saying that she had enjoyed the innocence of this nearly-vintage film. Fun and innocent...different from what we see now. It's all whitewashed and brilliant light during a summer in Greece. Cathy (Darryl Hannah) and Michael (Peter Gallagher) arrive in Oia, Santorini for a summer of hedonistic pleasures. They rent a villa by the sea for a mere $100 and week and set off on their adventure.

I should start by mentioning that I have always liked seeing Darryl Hannah in films and I miss her with Jackson Brown. And ever since Sex, Lies and Videotape (1989), I have taken notice of Peter Gallagher (and James Spader) with those extremely bushy eyebrows. He turns up in all kinds of television shows and movies, often playing the extremely handsome father figure these days. This 1982 film shows a very slender version of himself dressed in designer jeans, little shorts, and tiny speedo bathing trunks...until he gets with the program on the beaches of Greece and goes naked.

The story is simple. Young and in love, they travel to this exotic place to play house in a foreign land. Cathy is a budding photographer. Michael is just beginning to realize the appeal of beautiful women. He becomes attracted to an earthy slightly older woman, an archeologist named Lina (Valerie Quennessen). The promise of an all-out threesome is in the air. Once Cathy deals with her jealousy, the three become fast friends and she moves in with them.

The movie tagline us "They spent a summer of love--to the sounds of Chicago." Not so much Chicago, but I did hear a lot of Donna Summer and other disco beats. The scene in Greece was free and open with lots of socializing, beach nudity, alcohol, and disco dancing. One scene shows them in a club dancing on mashed grapes! The atmosphere is thick with passion and possibility. At one point Michael explains to Cathy that heat plus fuel plus oxygen yields fire. If one of the elements is missing, the fire goes out. That is about the depth of this movie, but still...we watch them struggle with jealousy, love and freedom as people of a certain age continue to do.

This movie would not be entertaining if the actors were not known to me. Part of the fun of movies is seeing favorite actors growing older along with us. We are all in this together. But in this movie, the characters are new to the world, wide-eyed and dewy. There are moments of dramatic dives and jumps off high cliffs into the sea, running up and down the monumental stucco hillside structures, cartwheels in The Acropolis. It makes one nostalgic for what was and what was not...a perfect summer movie!