In my opinion, I think this is Audrey Hepburn's greatest performance by far. She's wonderful in films such as Roman Holiday, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and Charade, but Audrey truely shines in The Nun's Story. Anyone else agree?
"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today."
Yes it is. She won the New York Film Critics award. She was in a tight race with her friend Elizabeth Taylor (Suddenly Last Summer) for the Oscar. Simone Signoret pulled an upset ( Room at the Top).
shareIn another year, Hepburn might have won the Oscar hands down. Signoret was simply great in Room at the Top. I'm pretty sure many were surprised that Signoret won since few non-American films are even nominated, let alone win an Academy Award.
"Dry your eyes baby, it's out of character."
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it is one of her best. my favorite is CHARADE....however, she was wonderful most of the time. I sat thru Roman Holiday 4 times the day i went to the movies to see it.
shareI wouldn't say Signoret's win is an upset. Yes, that year Hepburn won New York Film Critics Award, Taylor won the Golden Globe but Signoret won National Board of Review Award and finished second in NY Film Critics Award. All three awards are quite close to Oscar's pick during the 50s. On top of that Signoret also won the BAFTA (as did Hepburn) and Cannes that year albeit they don't always agrees with Oscar. By all accounts it was a neck-to-neck race between Hepburn, Signoret and Taylor.
shareI must say MFL seems an odd alternative (to Nun's Story) to hold up as AH's finest hour, given all the other truly wonderful things she did. I've always though MFL a catastrophic miscalculation on pretty well all counts, starting with AH's choice as star. I find her uncharacteristically uncomfortable from beginning to end -- and understandably so, for a superb actress performing with the realization that a good portion of her performance is going to be voiced by someone else -- how humiliating. And the movie itself is a lumbering throwback to the worst kind of overproduced, tacky musicals of the '50s, with a coating of "prestige picture" anxiety that freezes it in its tracks. And who was it who told Cecil Beaton his designs were the living end? Blown up to mammoth film proportions, they look positively gruesome. OK, I'll shut up.
I think it's possible to "love" an actress without having to love everything she ever did, and MFL is my case in point where Audrey Hepburn is concerned. In Nun's Story, on the other hand, I don't think any praise can be high enough for the concentration she brings to the smallest detail (thanks, of course, to Fred Zinnemann's inspired oversight) -- the casual but heartbreaking way she puts her boyfriend's photo down in her bedroom before leaving home, the way she takes back the pencil on her way out -- again a tug at the heart. The movie is full of these things, and that's one of the reasons I love it -- and AH in it -- so much.
The whole movie -- thanks to AH and the rest of an astonishing cast full of the absolute best British actresses of the day (try assembling something remotely like it today) and Fred Zinnemann and Franz Planer's images and Franz Waxman's radiant score -- produces a halo effect that I can't begin to describe, but it's similar to what you get from the films of Satyajit Ray. It's true that some of this radiance dissipates after Sister Luke gets to Africa and Hollywoodish melodrama kicks in, but even that's relatively low-key and tolerable under the circumstances. And the last five minutes: she dresses, folds and packs her hat, snaps the suitcase shut; the door clicks open and the outside world appears, slightly damp, and glowing, and scarily unfamiliar after her years away from it; she ventures out, strides up the alley, steps out of frame; the church bell rings. You don't breathe while all this is happening; I shiver as I write about it. It's film-making perfection of a kind you rarely see in films of any country, any era. It's a miracle it came about in a Hollywood production in the '50s.
Other top AH performances? For my money, Roman Holiday, of course. Two for the Road (a VERY different Audrey indeed, in an extraordinary movie not often seen these days). Funny Face (imagine having to act being in love with shriveled-up Fred Astaire). Coming through Blake Edwards's absurdly sugar-coated Breakfast at Tiffany's looking like a million bucks is surely a major achievement. Charade is nice. And she does absolutely wonderful blind-lady things in Wait Until Dark, though the movie sucks. Ditto (except for the blind part) Robin and Marian. She rescued a remarkable number of trashy movies for someone whose catalog is really quite small. I guess that's one of the reasons we love her so much.
Hi! shooby!Great said!I agree!
shareFred Astaire, Audrey personally requested to be her co-star in "Funny Face." That's the main reason she even did the movie. I think they looked good together since they were both so lively and jolly.
It's Gary Cooper and Audrey Hepburn in "Love in the Afternoon" that gives me the creeps. Doesn't help that there was a scene in there where Audrey was wearing pigtails- literally making Cooper look like a cradle-robber!
Yes, I find this to be Audrey's best performance. I always found her a good actress, but no more than that. This film made me change my mind, she shows a lot range and depth. She was quite a great actress!
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I vote for "1967 Wait until dark" is the best.
shareHmmm... I admit, this one of Audrey's best dramatic acting but I think "Wait Until Dark" was her best. Audrey played a blind woman perfectly... so perfect in fact, that you'll actually think she's blind. Though, Nun's Story and The Children's Hour was very good I just prefer "Dark" better.
shareHer performance in this film most certainly moved me. It's one of her best, however, I wouldn't say it was her Greatest. Actually when it comes to my opinion of Audrey Hepburn's "Greatest" it all depends on my mood. She's such a Great Actress that any one of her performances depending on my mood could be considered her "Greatest." But a very moving performance.
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