A Room with a View

A Room with a View, British motion picture about a young woman in the sexually repressed culture of early 20th-century England. Released in 1985, the film won an Academy Award for Ruth Prawer Jhabvala's screenplay, which was based on a novel by English writer E. M. Forster. When Lucy Honeychurch (played by Helena Bonham Carter) travels to Italy with her aunt, she meets George Emerson (Julian Sands), a bohemian man who tries to seduce her. Upon her return to England, she is forced to choose between free-spirited Emerson and her less emotional fiancé, Cecil Vyse (Daniel Day-Lewis). The story is a romance and a critique of English society at the turn of the century. Maggie Smith won a Golden Globe Award for her performance as Lucy Honeychurch’s spinster aunt. Producer-director team Ismail Merchant and James Ivory, and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala also collaborated on the screen adaptation of E. M. Forster’s novel Howards End.

Director

• James Ivory

Cast

• Maggie Smith (Charlotte Bartlett)
• Helena Bonham Carter (Lucy Honeychurch)
• Denholm Elliott (Mr. Emerson)
• Julian Sands (George Emerson)
• Daniel Day-Lewis (Cecil Vyse)
• Simon Callow (Reverend Beebe)
• Judi Dench (Miss Lavish)
• Rosemary Leach (Mrs. Honeychurch)
• Rupert Graves (Freddy Honeychurch)
• Patrick Godfrey (Mr. Eager)
• Fabia Drake (Catherine Alan)
• Joan Henley (Teresa Alan)
• Maria Britneva (Mrs. Vyse)
• Amanda Walker (The Cockney Signora)
• Peter Cellier (Sir Harry Otway)
• Mia Fothergill (Minnie Beebe)
• Patricia Lawrence (Mrs. Butterworth)
• Mirio Guidelli (Santa Croce Guide)
• Matyelock Gibbs (The New Charlotte)
• Kitty Aldridge (The New Lucy)
• Freddy Korner (Mr. Floyd)
• Elizabeth Marangoni (Miss Pole)
• Lucca Rossi (Phaeton)
• Isabella Celani (Persephone)
• Luigi Di Fiori (Murdered youth)

Awards

• Academy Award for Screenplay—Based on Material from Another Medium (1986): Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
• Academy Award for Art Direction (1986): Gianni Quaranta, Brian Ackland-Snow, Brian Savegar, Elio Altramura
• Academy Award for Costume Design (1986): Jenny Beavan, John Bright
• Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress (1987): Maggie Smith