Amazon.com Essentials:
The prestigious filmmaking trio of producer Ismail Merchant,
director James Ivory, and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala had made
other critically acclaimed films before A Room with a View was
released in 1985, but it was this popular film that made them
art-house superstars. Splendidly adapted from the novel by
E.M. Forster, it's a comedy of the heart, a passionate romance and a
study of repression within the British class system of manners and
mores. It's that system of rigid behavior that prevents young Lucy
Honeychurch (Helena Bonham Carter) from accepting the loving advances
of a free-spirited suitor (Julian Sands), who fears that she will
follow through with her engagement to a priggish intellectual (Daniel
Day-Lewis) whose capacity for passion is virtually nonexistent. During
and after a trip to Italy with her protective companion (Maggie
Smith), Lucy gradually gets in touch with her true emotions. The fun
of watching A Room with a View comes from seeing how Lucy's
thoughts and feelings finally arrive at the same romantic
conclusion. Through an abundance of humor both subtle and overt, this
crowd-pleasing "art movie" rose to an unexpected level of popular
appeal. The Merchant-Ivory team received eight Academy Award
nominations for their efforts, and won the Oscar for Best Adapted
Screenplay, Art Direction, and Costume Design. --Jeff Shannon
