A Room with a View

When a young Englishwoman named Lucy Honeychurch (Helena Bonham Carter) and her spinster chaperone Charlotte (Maggie Smith) travel to Italy, they become acquainted with a free-spirited and unconventional Englishman named Mr. Emerson (Denholm Elliot), and his enigmatic and romantically unhappy son, George (Julian Sands). After George kisses Lucy during a picnic in the Florentine hills, Charlotte rushes her back to England. Safely home, Lucy becomes engaged to her stiff and very proper fiancé Cecil (Daniel Day-Lewis). After finding out the Emersons have moved close by, Lucy has a hard time ignoring her attraction to the unsuitable George, and must wrestle with her inner romantic longings and choose between passion and convention. Nominated for eight Academy Awards in 1986 and winner of three, A Room with a View is the film that defined Merchant-Ivory as the masters of the romantic period piece and this brilliant adaptation of E.M. Forster's novel ranks as their very finest work. (Umbrella Entertainment)