Product Details

• Actors: Audrey Hepburn, Michael York, Gustavo Tavares
• Directors: Bruce Franchini
• Producers: Janis Blackschlager, Julie Leiferman, Kate Coe, Stuart Crowner
• Format: Box set, Color, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 6
• Studio: Perennial Ent.
• VHS Release Date: November 16, 1999
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6303632769
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #196,185 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Imagine the world's most elegant tour guide, illuminating some of the world's most breathtaking vistas. The Emmy-winning PBS series Gardens of the World with Audrey Hepburn features the graceful film icon, in her last screen appearance before her death in 1993, as host of a tour of the world's most elegant and spectacular gardens. Hepburn herself was a gardening enthusiast (at least one rose and one tulip have been named for her), and her passion for the subject will entrance even those who struggle to keep a pot of herbs on the windowsill. The chapters are organized around type of garden (rose gardens, formal, country, etc.) as well as geography (Japanese gardens, tropical), and within each segment, Hepburn, and her co-narrator, Michael York, outline the history, details and art behind all manner of gorgeous spreads.

The "Formal Gardens" segment, for instance, spans nearly 3,000 years, with the original gardens of the pharaohs providing fruit, shade trees, even herbs for embalming. The Persians introduced the concept of pleasure gardens, influenced by Islamic belief of heaven as a vast, restorative garden. The classical Greeks and Romans added statuary to the formal ideal; the Italians, cascading fountains; the French, the idea, embodied at Versailles, of man's mastery over nature. Every garden is breathtaking in its own way, yet there are principles that even a novice gardener can absorb: the notion of architecture and structure, inside which the "furniture" of flowers and other plants, as suggested by the British garden expert Penelope Hobhouse, can be placed just so. Along the way, and around the world through history, Hepburn is a compelling guide whose obvious passion for the subject makes the series as riveting as any nature documentary. Extras in the Special Tribute Edition include a documentary, In Pursuit of Beauty, in which Hepburn visits more than 30 locations (including Giverny, known as Monet's flower garden). It also includes an interview with Hepburn and a splendid soundtrack featuring selections by Debussy, Vivaldi, and Berlioz. --A.T. Hurley

Product Description

This series, originally presented in eight parts, grew from the book "Gardens of the World" by Penelope Hobhouse and Elvin McDonald. Audrey contributed the book's foreword, and hosts the series from the world's most famous gardens in the United States, Japan, Santo Domingo, Italy, Holland, France and England. After Audrey's illness in 1992, Michael York stepped in as host. Written by alfiehitchie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

50 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You don't have to be a gardener to love this show!, February 2, 2000

By 

Bunny Man! "mallard6" (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Gardens of the World With Audrey Hepburn (DVD)

This program offers maximum value. Not only are all the features of the original broadcasts on PBS and the set of tapes present, extras are included as well, including a profile of Audrey Hepburn, a promo for Penelope Hobhouse, and separate audio tracks for the major music used as backgrounds in the shows.

The DVD production is impeccable (and cheaper than VHS to boot). Color is wonderfully pure, and images crisp and sharp.

But above all, it is the many gorgeous gardens (worldwide) and Audrey Hepburn's appreciations of them that will hold you entranced. The scope is broad, and the loving care used in photography, presentation, and production are always evident. My own favorite is Monet's garden, but there are wonderful shots of many other spots as well.

This comes highly, and unreservedly recommended!

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not just eye candy!, August 17, 2000

By 

Charles S. Houser (Binghamton, NY) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Gardens of the World With Audrey Hepburn (DVD)

Beautifully conceived and beautifully executed, this is truly and amazing DVD! The two-sided disk contains eight half-hour visits to the world's most beautiful gardens, plus eighty minutes of great music-only tracks, and two great behind-the-scenes segments showing Ms Hepburn at her most charming and personable.

I bought this DVD because I'm a Hepburn fan and her participation in this project certainly lends the entire undertaking a touch of class. She introduces each segment, reads poetry (and Anne Frank), converses with gardeners, and makes observations of her own--usually as she drifts in or out of the picture wearing elegant Ralph Lauren outfits and swinging a straw basket or plucking a bloom or two. (Watching the episodes in quick succession, I realized how true it is that she always favors her left profile.) In some episodes, however, she is barely on screen at all. As these shows were taped the year before her death, I suspect her participation was limited by the state of her health and that she was not able to fly to every location.

Although the shows would have been much poorer without Ms Hepburn, they are substantial in their own right. I found the episode on "Tulips and Spring Bulbs" especially informative. The bulk of the script, it should be noted, fell into the lap of the narrator, Michael York. He rose to the occasion as best he could, but some of the text he was expected to read was surely not written to be read aloud by any human being. (One amusing moment occurred when Mr. York, using his best Oxonian English, referred to George Washington as "OUR founding father.")

The theme that seemed to run through all the episodes is that gardening is a delicate collaboration between man and nature. As Ms Hepburn states, quoting gardener Anne Leighton (?), "A garden, to be a garden, must represent a different world, however small, from the real world....Gardening offers man a chance to regulate at least one aspect of his life--to control his environment and show himself as he wishes to be."

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great series, odd DVD, March 25, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Gardens of the World With Audrey Hepburn (DVD)

The "Gardens Of The World" series can't be faulted in any way. The gardens shown are all stunning. Audrey Hepburn is so elegant, charming, and beautiful. On the technical side, though, this DVD is disappointing. It's the only DVD I've ever purchased where you can't see how much time has elapsed while you are viewing, nor can you see which chapter you are watching. And, if you stop the DVD, it doesn't resume playing where you left off. No other DVD I own (and I own quite a few) is like this.