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93 of 95 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Perhaps the most romantic movie ever made, May 16, 2004
This was Audrey Hepburn's debut in a starring role. She was 24-years-old and had appeared in two or three other movies but just in bit parts. Here she plays a reigning European princess visiting Rome who would like an escape from her daily regime of official duties, thus the title and theme of the movie, a Roman holiday.Gregory Peck plays an American newspaper reporter living in the Eternal City. We first see him playing poker with his cronies, and losing. His relative "poverty" and Princess Ann's fabulous wealth and station present a formidable barrier to their ever finding true love and marital happiness. Part of the fun of the script is in seeing how this will play out and how their differences are resolved in the end. I will give you a small hint: very carefully! The script comes from a story by Dalton Trumbo who is perhaps best known as the author of the anti-war novel, Johnny Got His Gun. Trumbo was one of the "Hollywood Ten" who were blacklisted from working in the industry during the excesses of the McCarthy era. He went to Mexico and continued working on film scripts but under assumed names or had his scripts presented by "fronts." In this case Ian McLellan Hunter fronted for Trumbo and won an Academy Award for the story. Later the Academy awarded Trumbo a posthumous Oscar for his work. Long time Hollywood studio director William Wyler directed the film entirely on location in Rome. He has a formidable list of credits going well back into the silent film era including such outstanding films as Wuthering Heights (1939), The Letter (1940), The Little Foxes (1941), etc. His clear directorial style and his attention to detail work well here. The sets in Rome are charming, especially Peck's bachelor apartment. The bit players, especially Peck's landlord are excellent and the events are dreamy in just the way a romantic meeting in Rome ought to be. Wyler is especially effective in presenting Audrey Hepburn in the most flattering light and getting the audience to identify with her. Gregory Peck's character should be a bit of an adventurous rake who finds that love is more important than money or fame, but it is impossible for Peck to play a morally compromised character, and so even as he appears to be using Princess Ann for his own ends, his behavior is always correct. I was somewhat amused to notice that at all times Peck appears wearing a tie! Eddie Albert plays Peck's friend, a photographer/artist. It is interesting to note how Hollywood's perception of the paparazzi has changed over the years. Here blood-sucking, intrusive greed does not exist. Instead we have noble self-sacrifice! I have seen most of Miss Hepburn's movies and I can say that she was never more enchanting than she is here. She is gorgeous and cute at the same time, charming and impish, sweet, regal and very winning. In a sense she started at the top with this film, garnering her only Oscar as Best Actress in 1953; but as her fans know she never came down off that pedestal. Even playing poor Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady (1964), there was never any doubt about the quality of her style and character. This is the most romantic film I have ever seen, perhaps partly because Miss Hepburn is so wonderful, but also because the script in a sense turns the usual woman's romantic fantasy upside down. Instead of the woman finding that the man she is in love with has fabulous wealth and position, it is the other way around! The ending manages to be realistic yet romantic. There is a hint of something almost spiritual beyond what happens. So convincing are Hepburn and Peck that one can almost believe the story is true; and indeed I am sure that Trumbo lifted the essentials of the plot from some ancient tale. I have a weakness for movies about unrequited love, or love that goes on forever, or love that is caught at some perfect moment and lives eternally in that moment. Roman Holiday is one of those near perfect movies that plays beautifully upon one of these themes.
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43 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
It's always open season on princesses, May 22, 2004
ROMAN HOLIDAY should appeal to everyone who loves a good romance, and this one is a great one. The rest us of will be well content with the splendor of Rome and the chance to see the remarkable Audrey Hepburn in her debut movie. In other words, ROMAN HOLIDAY has something for every palate.
The plot? Princess Ann (we're never quite sure which country she's princess of) is enduring a grueling tour of European nations. Weary to death of the royal treatment, one night Ann escapes into the Roman night. Unfortunately for her she had a while earlier been given an injection to help her sleep. The drug takes effect while she's out and about, and reporter Joe Bradley (Gregory Peck) discovers her asleep on a street bench. Believing she's inebriated, and being a gentleman, he tries to deliver her safely to her home. That plan fails and, being a gentleman, Bradley arranges for the young stranger (he doesn't learn she's the missing princess until the next scene) to sleep on the sofa in his small, one-room apartment.
Cary Grant was originally offered the part of Joe Bradley and he turned it down. One of the dvd's specials tells us he refused the role because he didn't want to play second fiddle to an ingenue. Maybe so. It's tempting to decide, on the basis of this scene, that Peck was woefully miscast. Ann, nearly asleep on her feet, asks Bradley "Will you help me undress?" A natural enough request coming from royalty, I guess. Bradley fumbles around with her neck scarf, unties it, hands it to her and says "You can handle the rest."
Peck plays the scene for a smile. Grant would have made it one of the highlights of the movie. After savoring the opportunity for the audience's delight he would have removed the tie and given the camera a quick peek, as if to say "Listen here, I know this is a cliched, silly situation. But doesn't this look like fun. Don't we make a handsome couple?" Grant was a supple pagan god who drank more than once from the well of hedonism, and he was always careful to bring the audience along for the good times. Peck was an Old Testament prophet, a little too stern and stiff to give himself over to pleasure.
What Peck brings to the role is authority and a handsome arm for Hepburn to rest on. Grant would have distracted us, and ROMAN HOLIDAY is best when our attention is focused squarely on Audrey Hepburn. She delivers a tour de force performance, and you can understand the excitement she generated even after a half century.
The specials include the documentary "Remembering ROMAN HOLIDAY", which surprised me with all the people who were involved and dropped out of the production of the movie. "Edith Head: The Paramount Years" is a short biography of the famous and talented fashion designer. "Restoring ROMAN HOLIDAY" shows us a number of before and after shots - this is a VERY clean print. There is also a trio of theatrical trailers and a stills photo gallery.
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24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A charming, delightful gem of a movie, May 22, 2001
Nearly fifty years after it was made, "Roman Holiday" still brings a gleeful smile of pleasure and delight to its viewer, who will be undoubtedly charmed by this wonderful whimsy of a film. The story of a princess escaping her fairy tale life, and finding her own fairy tale outside the palace with a handsome newsman captivated audiences in 1953, and still does today.In her feature film debut, the delightful Audrey Hepburn shines as the gamine Princess Anne, who, loathing her tiresome, claustrophobic life as a royal family member, escapes from her caretakers while on a royal international tour in Rome. When a young newsman, Joe Bradley, (Gregory Peck) stumbles onto the naive young woman, he realizes who she is, and smelling the scoop of a lifetime, takes her on a holiday through the sights and pleasures of Rome while his photographer buddy Irving Radovich (Eddie Albert) relentlessly shoots pictures with all sorts of camouflaged gadgets. Joe and "Anya" bask in the joys of the lush city, from lunch at a sidewalk cafe (where the princess also enjoys her first cigarette) to a wild escapade on a runaway motorcycle, to a romantic moonlit dance by a lake... and before the pair realizes it, they've fallen for each other, but can they be together... a princess and a commoner? William Wyler directed this Oscar-winning masterpiece, nominated for, among other awards, Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor for Eddie Albert, and winner for Audrey Hepburn as the year's Best Actress for her brilliant, utterly charming princess. A princess, indeed. Hepburn, the beautiful young gamine, is indeed every inch a princess in her sensitive and beautiful portrayal. Gregory Peck's rugged charm and humor are a perfect match for Hepburn, and the chemistry between the two is a joy to watch. The exquisite cinematography is extraordinary to see, even in black-and-white, and the lively script makes for many golden scenes: One scene in the beginning has Hepburn trying to retrieve a lost shoe during an Embassy dance, another has Hepburn getting her first haircut in an Italian salon, and the whole picture is worth the scene in which Peck dares Hepburn to put her hand into the infamous "Mouth of Truth": "Legend has it that if you're given to lying, it'll bite your hand off." Slyly demonstrating, he suddenly yells in agony as the terrified Hepburn screams. He brings his arm out with his hand disappeared, and Hepburn shrieks. But suddenly the hand pops through his coat jacket as Hepburn squeals with mock-fury. And the beautiful, beautiful scene by the lake as the two look into each other's eyes while they dance... what a heavenly feeling you get watching that scene alone. It's a charming film, absolutely beautiful. "Roman Holiday" is a movie about two people falling in love, and it's a movie that you will fall in love with too. This is a film to watch again and again with somebody you love... if you do, it's only that much more of a holiday.
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