Come September

Hanging out at an Italian villa with Rock Hudson and Gina Lollobrigida sounds like a painless way to kill a vacation--and Come September is a pretty painless movie, too. Rock is a millionaire who spends a month at his home on the Riviera every year, except this year he's come early and surprised his staff, who've been running the place as a paying hotel. This is one of those comedies of sexual frustration--Rock can't get alone with Gina, because the "hotel" is overrun with American teenagers (chief among them Sandra Dee and Bobby Darin, who married after meeting on the shoot). The plot is labored, and director Robert Mulligan shows little feel for farce (he would shortly hit his stride with To Kill a Mockingbird). At least the location shooting has a nice summer breeze to it, and Darin sings "Multiplication" in a nightclub, complete with hepcat moves. --Robert Horton