70th Anniversary of the Roman Holiday

On August 20, 1953 at the Venice International Film Festival, the premiere of William Wyler’s film "Roman Holiday" took place. The film was nominated for the Golden Lion, like 13 other films, but that year it was decided not to award the main prize to anyone. Why is not known.

In 1954, "Roman Holiday" received 10 Oscar nominations, of which it won three, including an Oscar for Audrey Hepburn for Best Lead Actress. In the most important nominations - Best Film and Best Director - "Roman Holiday" and the director of this film lost to the film "From Here to Eternity" and, accordingly, to its director Fred Zinnemann.

In the same 1954 "Roman Holiday" received 4 nominations for the British BAFTA Awards, but won only one. And again this was the Audrey Hepburn Award for Best British Actress. In the Best Film from any Source nomination, William Wyler's film lost to Rene Clement's undisputed masterpiece, "Jeux interdits (Forbidden Games)".

As for the assessment of the film by film critics, against the general background of enthusiastic reviews both from foreign critics and from Russian-speaking critics, the most curious to me was the assessment of the Russian film critic Evgeny Nefyodov:

“the film ... leaves the impression of a witty and simply clever work, not at all exhausted by a simple story of a magical vacation, arranged for pleasure by a student of a non-existent school. The lion's share of the success, including the commercial one, was ensured by amazingly well-chosen performers of the main roles ... So the ending can hardly be classified as a typical Hollywood "happy ending" ... "

It’s hard to imagine now, but the film “Roman Holiday” had a real chance of not taking place. Initially, it was planned to assign director functions to Frank Capra, and he, in turn, was going to invite Cary Grant and Elizabeth Taylor to the leading roles. However, having learned that the script of the film was written by Dalton Trumbo, Frank Capra left the project. About the reasons - a little later.

William Wyler, who succeeded Capra, initially intended to follow the path of his predecessor and began negotiations with Cary Grant and Elizabeth Taylor. Taylor refused, citing employment. She at that moment starred in the film "The Girl Who Had Everything", plus she was pregnant. In short, there was no way to wander between Hollywood and Italy. A completely understandable and respectful reason.

Then Wyler proposed the role of Princess Anne Gene Simmons. But she was also busy: she starred at the same time in four films. Upset, Wyler thought about stopping work on the project.

But then someone suggested him to try Audrey Hepburn. Audrey by that time was a little-known actress, behind whose shoulders were only shooting commercials. However, Audrey was invited to casting. But Wyler, skeptical of a little-known actress, did not even attend the casting, entrusting it to his assistant. But the assistant did a trick that decided everything, including the fate of Audrey Hepburn. Namely: he simply did not turn off the camera after he himself gave the command: "Stop. Shot." And Audrey, while she thought that the shooting was in progress, was very constrained. But as soon as she heard “Stop”, she completely relaxed and began to play so that she enthralled all those present on the set. Then these shots partially entered the film: when she tries on clothes, when she changes her hair in a hairdresser. It would seem that the problem has been resolved.

But then a problem with Cary Grant aroused. He also refused. Moreover, he motivated his refusal by the fact that at his nearly fifty he was not suitable for romantic partners for 23-year-old Audrey Hepburn. The funny thing is that 10 years later he found himself quite suitable for playing a romantic couple with the same Hepburn in the film "Charade". Oh, these male coquetry!

But, apparently, fate was so pleased. Since Gregory Peck, who replaced Grant, not only turned out to be a worthy replacement, but in all respects surpassed Grant.

On this, it seemed, the problems with creating the film ended. But it had to happen that literally on the eve of the planned release of the picture on the screens in the royal family of Great Britain a scandal erupted: Princess Margaret fell in love with the 39-year-old colonel of the British Air Force. In order not to provoke an international scandal already, an additional scene of Princess Anne's visit to Great Britain had to be shot, so that no one would think that the unnamed kingdom of Anna was Great Britain.

In the end, the film was released in the United States and many other countries. It should be noted that in the USA the popularity of the picture was slightly lower than in Europe or Japan. Suffice it to say that of the $ 12 million collected by the film, only 5 million were earned in the United States, the rest in Europe and Asia.

But I would not say that with the release of the film on the screens, the problems that accompanied it stopped. The fact is that the credits for the film did not contain completely reliable information: instead of the true author of the script, Dalton Trumbo, other people were indicated. Although related to the creation of the script, but completely secondary. And the reason for this is that the name Trumbo was banned. Shortly before, Dalton Trumbo, like many other American artists, was accused of "sympathy for communism." He was asked to name other "sympathizers", he refused, and then received a year in prison "for contempt of the US Congress." That's precisely for this reason, as mentioned above, Frank Capra refused to work on this film. Capra was a staunch anti-communist, and the State Department often used him when he had to “stop the spread of communist propaganda” coming from Soviet or Chinese filmmakers at international film festivals.

In short, the extortion of the names of dissidents, which is considered traditional for the communist regime, turns out to be quite common practice in "democratic" America, which prides itself on its concern for copyright. And not only extinction: the Oscar awarded to the film for the best script was also not received by the author. Although the era of McCarthyism formally ended back in 1957, it took the American Film Academy nearly 40 years to decide on the restoration of elementary justice. Only in 1993, already the widow of Trumbo, who died in 1976, was awarded an Oscar. And only in December 2011 the US Scriptwriters Guild decided to add the name of Dalton Trumbo as the author of the literary script in the official descriptions of the film and in the credits of the restored versions.

Unlike many other American films of the time, "Roman Holiday" were able to reach Soviet cinemas. True, seven years later. But this is trifle compared to other pictures. And shortened by 5 minutes. But this is still big trifle! But then with what circulation this film was released on the screens of Soviet cinemas of the movie studio named after Gorky - 1157 copies. And this aroused the anger of the ideological commission of the CPSU Central Committee. Probably, in order not to arouse the real fury of the party leadership, the Soviet film distributors did not advertise anywhere on the actual number of views of "Roman Holiday" in the USSR. But one can indirectly estimate: in the same 1960, the film "Alyoshkina Love" was released in the USSR. With a circulation of 714 copies, 23.7 million people watched it. Estimate how many people could watch the film, released in a print run of 1157 copies.

Audrey Hepburn for the role received 12,500 dollars. Today, this amount is equal to 120 thousand dollars. But she won an Oscar. For comparison: in 2006, the movie "Pledge This!" with Paris Hilton in the lead role was released on the screens of movie theaters in the USA and many other countries, including Russia. The film on IMDB and on Kinopoisk has received ratings from 1.5 to 1.8. Both the film and the actress were nominated for the title, respectively, of the worst film and worst actress. But Paris received $ 1 million for this role, that is, more than 8 times more than Hepburn for her role in "Roman Holiday". This is to the question of how true art is valued in American cinema. And further. With a "Pledge This!" budget of $ 8.5 million, the box office was $ 1.7 million. Of these, 1.5 million were collected in Russia! Glory to the Russian film distribution! If the Soviet film distributors, who were under the most severe ideological oppression, at risk, if not for life and freedom, then for material well-being, certainly, facilitated the penetration of masterpieces such as “Roman Holiday” on the Soviet movie screens, then the Russian film distributors fecalize the cinema screens with “works” like "Pledge This!".

If we talk about the evaluation of Wyler's film by modern moviegoers, then 74% of users of IMDB and Kinopoisk gave "Roman Holiday" ratings from 8 to 10. Taking this into account and the above, the rating of the film according to FilmGourmand's version was 8.368, making it 387th Rank in the Golden Thousand.

... And William Wyler after looking at Hepburn’s samples said: “She was beautiful ... our new star has no ass, no boobs, no tight clothes, no high heels. In short, she’s a pure Martian. But she will be a sensation . " And so it happened.