Roman Holiday (1953)

1953

Directed by: William Wyler

Music: Georges Auric

Starring: Gregory Peck, Audrey Hepburn, Eddie Albert, 

Hartley Power, Harcourt Williams, Margaret Rawlings, 

Tullio Carminati, Paola Borboni, Paolo Carlini, 

Laura Solari, Claudio Ormelli

I'm not a great fan of Valentine's Day as it is celebrated today. I find the concept of showing someone he/she is special on one particular day rather silly, and the commercialisation of what should be a personal matter between two people who are in love, sickens me. But I'm a sucker for romantic comedies, even bittersweet ones. And there is one film in particular, of which, even after repeated viewings, I can never get enough. It is the perfect combination of being romantic without being diabetically sweet, humorous, without resorting to slapstick, and tender, without deteriorating into bathos. It heralded the entry of one of Hollywood's brightest stars, a lady in every sense of the word, one whose enchanting visage and gamin charm would win hearts everywhere.


Princess Ann (Audrey Hepburn) is the crown princess of a small (and unspecified) country who is on a goodwill tour of the European nations. 

 

After having successfully wooed London, Amsterdam, and Paris, she has now arrived in Rome, the Eternal City. No one seeing her smile graciously and winsomely at the ball given in her honour could suspect that the young princess, in fact, is tired and fed up of greeting all the nobility who have arrived to meet her.

 

Neither do the assembled nobility who watch her twirling gracefully on the dance floor realise that she is beginning to chafe at all the rigid rules of polite society surrounding her every action. As she is told the next day's schedule by her lady-in-waiting (Margaret Rawlings), she mutters 'Thankyou', and 'No, thank you' almost by rote, until she mixes them up - much to her companion's chagrin.

She is too well-brought-up to be rude, but she comes very near what one would call a tantrum, and a doctor is called in to see what is wrong. The doctor is not unsympathetic. In fact, he tells her that the best thing for her would be to do exactly as she wishes for a while (only he doesn't quite mean it the way she takes it); but he also gives her a sedative so she will calm down and go to sleep. 

Instead, the intrepid princess climbs out of her balcony and sneaks out of the embassy by hiding in the back of a truck standing outside, determined to experience a Rome she has never seen. Unfortunately for her, the sedative begins to take effect and though she manages to climb out of the truck, she falls asleep on the restraining walls of a building. She is spotted by Joe Bradley (Gregory Peck), an expatriate American reporter working for the American News Service in Rome. 

He has no clue who she is, but he calls a taxi to take her home. Unfortunately, she is not very co-operative. Between handling a very woozy Ann and dealing with a taxi driver who just wants to go home to his bambinos, Joe is forced to take her to his house. 

Ann is still in her princess mode though, and Joe is quite taken aback when she asks him to help her undress. Her innocence amuses him ("I've never been with a man before, even with my dress on. With my dress off, it's most unusual", she tells him. "I don't seem to mind. Do you?") The beleaguered Joe decides to go out for some coffee.

Back at the embassy, Ann's companions have discovered her absence. She is heir to the throne, and they have to hide her disappearance to avoid any potential trouble. They put out an official bulletin informing the press of the Princess' sudden illness. 

The next morning, Joe oversleeps, and having missed the press conference that the visiting princess was to give, goes straight to work, leaving Ann fast asleep. He fibs about an alleged interview, making up all the answers, until his editor, Hennessy (Hartley Power), informs him irascibly that the event had been cancelled due to the princess' illness. 

As Hennessy slaps a newspaper into Joe's hands, the latter is taken aback - he's just left the princess sleeping in his apartment. Seizing the opportunity (after making sure the princess is still where he left her), he cons Hennessy into offering him $5000 for an exclusive interview - 'The private and innermost longings of a Princess'.

He hurries back to find Ann completely disoriented. She has no clue where she is, or how she got there, or even who he is. But he is totally disarmed when, instead of screaming blue murder when she realises she spent the night with him, she smiles delightedly. She introduces herself as Anya. 

Anya/Ann is flustered when she realises it is noon, and decides to hurry away. While she is taking a quick bath, Joe calls his friend, Irving Radovich (Eddie Albert), a photographer, to help him cover a sensational scoop. Coming back, he offers to show Anya around Rome, but she demurs.

Out on her own, Ann decides to enjoy her freedom instead of going back to the embassy, even getting a haircut, her charm winning over the barber and a florist. Joe, following her, meets her 'accidentally-on-purpose' on the Spanish Steps. 

She confesses that she would love to spend a day doing all the things she wanted to do, and he convinces her to live dangerously. And so begins Ann's introduction to a normal life. Irving joins them as Joe is treating her to a champagne at a sidewalk cafe, and nearly gives the game away. (Joe has been pretending he doesn't know who she is, and hasn't told her he is a reporter either.) But Joe manages to let him in on the secret. 

And so begins a mad, wonderful adventure. The runaway princess gets to do all the things that she has never done...

 

...and all the while, Irving is snapping photographs. But soon, after some dancing on a river boat, and being chased by the secret service, and a fall (and a jump) into the river, it is midnight, and the fairy tale must end. But are Joe and Ann to be untouched by the day's happenings?

 Fans of this classic romance know how this ends, so I won't go any further. Roman Holiday was worth the price of its ticket just to watch a fairytale-that-wasn't unfold its tenderness onscreen. 

This was Audrey's film, and how she sparkled. Elfin, enchanting, wistful, adorable - one runs out of adjectives to describe Audrey Hepburn in this film. She is alternately regal and childlike, and her pitiful expression as she stands bereft watching the man she loves walk away from her is a complete antithesis to the wondrous rapture in her eyes earlier when she realises she loves him. 

Gregory Peck offers a restrained foil to her impishness, his attraction to her warring with his professional instincts. Finally, he walks away from a story that could have made him rich, and the viewer realises he could have done no less. 

Their performance, coupled with the intensity of their chemistry onscreen nearly, but not quite, eclipses the stellar performance of the supporting cast, especially Eddie Albert as Irving Radovich, Joe's photographer friend. 

Shot on location in Rome, the plot-line has been used many times before and since; the princess (or prince) disguising herself as a commoner, falling in love while so disguised with someone who is totally unacceptable to her station in life. Yet, in a way, Ann is also playing Princess, especially in the beginning, when everything about her rule-bound life irks her. It takes a trial-by-fire - of falling in love, of experiencing what it means to be totally free, of losing that love, all within 12 hours, to teach her the duty and responsibility that comes with her position. So much so, when the General castigates her for running away, and reminds her of her duty, she remarks gently, but firmly: Your Excellency, I trust you will not find it necessary to use that word again. Were I not completely aware of my duty to my family and to my country, I would not have come back tonight... or indeed ever again!

A Vespa has never seemed so romantic, nor Rome so beautiful as it did when the chemistry between Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn lit up the city. 

If I ever make a list of romantic films to swoon by, Roman Holiday would top the list. It is impossible to watch this film and not fall in love with Ann and Joe, and the whole idea of falling in love. It is impossible not to wish for such love, even if it did not have the requisite happy ending. 

If there is one scene that epitomises the saying 'It's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all', it is the last scene where Joe obliquely promises Princess Ann that her faith in him will not be betrayed, and the look on her face when she knows it is goodbye. It is the only way the film could have ended, but I never watch it but that I'm whispering, "Don't let her walk away. Go on, forget all about her ghastly duty and live, for heavens' sake!" But then, as Joe tells Ann, "Life isn't always what one likes, is it?"

Trivia: The film is very reminiscent of It Happened One Night. Frank Capra had commissioned the screenplay in 1949 from Ian McLellan Hunter who covered for Dalton Trumbo, the original scriptwriter, as a variation of his 1934 film. Trumbo had been blacklisted by Senator McCarthy's witchhunt, and until the DVD was released in 2003, was never credited for his script. Capra intended to cast Cary Grant and Elizabeth Taylor, but when the script came back to Paramount Pictures after Capra's exit from the studio, William Wyler took over.  

Audrey Hepburn, then an upcoming British actress, having starred successfully on Broadway in Gigi (she won the Theatre World Award for this role), was almost rejected during the audition. Only, the cameraman kept the camera running even after the director called 'Cut' during the audition, and her vivacity off-camera charmed the director. The offer of the role was to cost him Cary Grant, however, since Grant felt that he would look too old opposite the young Hepburn. (He would act with Hepburn later, in Charade, though still bothered about the age difference between them, he ensured that it was her character who would chase him.)

Enter Gregory Peck, who added star value to the project. He was itching to do a comedy, but complained that every script that was offered to him had the imprint of Cary Grant. It was at Peck's urging that Audrey Hepburn was also given top billing alongside him - instead of the tiny 'introducing Audrey Hepburn' line that was initially intended. Peck predicted his costar would win the Oscar for her role even before the film released, and he was to be proved right; Audrey Hepburn won not only the Academy Award for Best Actress that year, but also the BAFTA award and the Golden Globe for Best Actress for her portrayal of Princess Ann. The film was nominated for ten Academy Awards, and won three. 

ps: And because this is the film which made me fall in love with all things Audrey...