I really enjoyed watching Roman Holiday this morning. I saw it years ago, but rewatched it on Netflix because my friend Michael saw Trumbo and told me that Dalton Trumbo wrote it and went uncredited because he was blacklisted at the time. (The movie's title sequence now has his name restored under a story credit, and it looks as authentic as if it were originally there.)
The film still holds up very well as a fun movie about a princess (Audrey Hepburn) escaping from her palace to live as a "normal" person while visiting Rome, and Gregory Peck plays a journalist who meets her by chance and is charmed by her while secretly trying to write a story on her on a bet, not letting her know that he knows her real identity.
The film still holds up very well as a fun movie about a princess (Audrey Hepburn) escaping from her palace to live as a "normal" person while visiting Rome, and Gregory Peck plays a journalist who meets her by chance and is charmed by her while secretly trying to write a story on her on a bet, not letting her know that he knows her real identity.
They are really sweet together, Rome looks like a fantasy version of Rome but is nice in the movie, they ride on a Vespa around town, Hepburn gets a cute haircut and has a gelato, the Mouth of Truth scene is still funny over 60 years later, and I like that the love story is unrequited but still has a good ending.
It was a very pleasant movie, and there aren't many good "prince/princess escapes to be normal person in the world" movies. Coming to America is one of the top ones. I just watched a terrible TV movie called A Prince For Christmas, where a British prince escapes his upcoming arranged marriage nuptials and goes to a small American town, where he meets a waitress who wants adventure in her life, and they fall in love while he pretends to be an average person. They are bland as hell, the prince is way too much of a romantic fantasy to be believed, the waitress' ex-boyfriend is portrayed as a jerk because he wants to live a small town family life and doesn't trust the prince, and the town looks like a 1950s postcard come to life. It was bad, and Roman Holiday was much sweeter and more joyful to watch.
It was a very pleasant movie, and there aren't many good "prince/princess escapes to be normal person in the world" movies. Coming to America is one of the top ones. I just watched a terrible TV movie called A Prince For Christmas, where a British prince escapes his upcoming arranged marriage nuptials and goes to a small American town, where he meets a waitress who wants adventure in her life, and they fall in love while he pretends to be an average person. They are bland as hell, the prince is way too much of a romantic fantasy to be believed, the waitress' ex-boyfriend is portrayed as a jerk because he wants to live a small town family life and doesn't trust the prince, and the town looks like a 1950s postcard come to life. It was bad, and Roman Holiday was much sweeter and more joyful to watch.
When they say 'they don't make them like they used to' this is one of the films they are talking about.
ReplyDeleteLovely film, lovely review.