A Room with A View (1986), the most popular and successful film produced by the producer-director team of Ishmael Merchant and James Ivory, is said to be a subtle and hilarious comedy.
Its first-rate British cast tells the story, set in the early 1900s, of prim and proper Lucy Honeychurch (Helena Bonham-Carter) who does the cultural tour of Italy chaperoned by her aunt (Maggie Smith). They are dismayed to find on their arrival at their pensione in Florence that the rooms with a view they had been promised are not available, but fellow British tourists, Mr. Emerson and his son George, promptly offer to give up their rooms, with views, to the newcomers. When the earnest and admiring George passionately kisses Lucy on an outing, horrified Aunt Charlotte takes her back to England where fate in fact brings the Emersons to their part of Surrey.
Confusion reigns within Lucy as she contemplates both George, who is a guest of her home and family, and her cultured but priggish fiancé, Cecil, (Daniel Day-Lewis), and has to battle with her feelings for both.
With picturesque locations in Italy and rural England, this film won three Academy Awards for Best Art Direction-Set Design, Best Costume Design and Best Screenplay. It also won numerous awards for its director and producer for Best Film, for its cinematography, editing and music, and acting awards for many in its cast, in particular Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress awards for Maggie Smith and Best Supporting Actor awards for Daniel Day-Lewis: from, among others, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) awards, the Golden Globe awards, the German Art House Cinema Guild and other international film festivals, from the London and New York Film Critics Circles, the US National Board of Review and the Writers and the Directors Guilds of America.
The film starts at 6 pm as usual and its running time is two hours. Admission is free. Arrangements will be in place at the National Gallery in the event of inclement weather or a power outage.
