Up at the Villa is a 2000 romantic drama film directed by Philip Haas and starring Kristin Scott Thomas, Anne Bancroft, James Fox, Derek Jacobi, and Sean Penn.

[3] A recently widowed Englishwoman, Mary Panton (Kristin Scott Thomas), is staying at the villa of some wealthy friends outside of Florence, Italy in 1938.

After meeting her old friend Sir Edgar Swift (James Fox) at a party celebrating the Munich Agreement, she is surprised when he proposes marriage to her the next day.

That evening, at a party hosted by her friend, the Princess San Ferdinando (Anne Bancroft), she meets a married American man named Rowley Flint (Sean Penn), who has a reputation for being a rogue.

Rowley drives Mary home, but on the way stops at a small church, where she confesses that her husband was an abusive alcoholic who died in a car crash, leaving her destitute.

That same day Mary is summoned to a meeting between the English expatriates and the city authorities, where the local Fascist administrator, Beppino Leopardi (Massimo Ghini), informs them that they will have to register with the police to continue living in Italy.

He arrives and the two transfer the body to the woods down the road, where Rowley plants an unregistered gun of his so that the suicide cannot be traced back to Mary.

He announces that the Florence police have arrested Rowley for possessing a handgun belonging to Sir Edgar Swift which was not registered when he entered Italy.