This is not what we were led to expect.
We were to see the Arno.
The signora wrote "South rooms with a view, close together".
Instead of which, we have north rooms without a view and far apart.
Hurry and get dressed or we'll miss our dinner on top of everything else.
She had no business doing it. No business at all!
Any nook does for me, but it is hard that you have no view.
No, you must have a view, too.
- Buonasera. - Buonasera.
Miss Lavish, what a recommendation for a place!
Indeed, Miss Alan, it is.
Between the squalor of London and the squalor of Prato, there is a great gulf fixed.
By going off the track, you get to know the country,
see the little towns, Gubbio, Settignano, Galuzzo,
San Gimignano, Monteriggioni.
Their mixture of the primitive with the classical is irresistible.
- Miss Pole? - Yes, Mr. Emerson.
What is that you are taking? It's not lemonade, is it?
- Yes, it is. - Put it right away, Miss Pole.
Lemonade is very bad for the stomach.
Oh!
I shall tell the signora to give the next south view available to you.
- Why not to you? - No, I insist.
This meat has surely been boiled.
For stock. It's lost all its flavor.
Monteriggioni is not only quaint,
but one meets the Italians in all their simplicity and charm.
Wasn't Monteriggioni where we saw the cornflowers, Teresa?
An entire carpet of them. It was delightful!
I find the cornflower the most delightful of flowers.
I prefer something bolder - the reckless rose, the tempestuous tulip.
- Your mother would never forgive me. - She'd want you to have it.
On no account. The view of the Arno is yours.
I don't know why we're arguing, because we have no view.
I have a view. And so does George.
My son George here.
You can have our rooms. We'll have yours. We can change.
- Why not? - Thank you very much.
- We could not impose on your kindness. - Why?
- You see... - Hush, Lucy.
Women like looking at a view. Men don't. George, persuade them.
It's obvious they should have the rooms.
- Signora? - No, thank you.
We could clear out in fifteen minutes. These niceties go against common sense!
Every kind of sense. I don't care what I see outside. My vision is within.
Here is where the birds sing and where the sky is blue.
Come, Lucy.
Let them have the view if they want it. Why not? George, go after them.
What an impossible person!
- He meant to be kind. - I know how to deal with these people.
Charlotte, you dealed rudely. You dealed wrongly.
This pensione is a failure. Tomorrow we'll change.
- It's Mr. Beebe. - Who?
Charlotte, we can't change now.
- Mr. Beebe. - Don't you remember us?
Miss Bartlett and Miss Honeychurch.
- We met at Tunbridge Wells. - That very cold Easter.
How do you do?
- I heard you are to be our vicar. - Yes, I move into the rectory in June.
We did feel so sorry for you in the dining room.
- Mr. Emerson is so tactless. - But he meant to be kind.
This old gentleman and his son offered us their rooms with a view.
It was most indelicate!
But things that are indelicate can sometimes be beautiful.
- Yes! - I am the chaperone to my young cousin Lucy.
It would be serious if I put her under an obligation to people of whom I know nothing.
- I wouldn't think much harm could have come. - There.
You think I ought to have accepted? You think I have been narrow-minded.
I never suggested that.
If you would allow me, I would be happy to act as intermediary with Mr. Emerson.
He would not take advantage nor expect gratitude.
He has rooms he does not value and thinks you would.
Charlotte, please.
My wishes are unimportant compared with yours.
I am only here through your kindness.
If you want me to turn these gentlemen out of their rooms, I will.
Would you, Mr. Beebe, kindly tell Mr...
- Emerson. - Emerson...
...we accept his offer?
I would like to thank your father personally for his kindness.
You can't. He's in his bath.
I would have given the larger room to you,
but I happen to know it was the young man's.
In my small way, I am a woman of the world.
And I know where things can lead.
Whatever does it mean?
Lucy, get dressed or the better part of the day will be gone.
You said you liked cornflowers.
- So we brought you cornflowers. - Oh, how kind!
They're your type of flowers. They have your personality.
I'd like to see them in your hair.
There are no jewels more becoming to a lady.
May I say something rather daring?
Mr. Beebe, you sound like Miss Lavish.
- Are you writing a novel, too? - If I were, you would be my heroine.
And I should write "If Miss Honeychurch ever takes to live as she plays...
"...it will be very exciting, both for us and for her."
Mother doesn't like me playing Beethoven. She says I'm peevish afterwards.
Naturally, one would be stirred up.
Won't you play some more?
No, I think I'll go out.
Alone? Is that wise, Miss Honeychurch?
To be wise, one might have stayed at home.
I'll not go far. I promise.
I'm sorry.
Whatever's the matter with dear Miss Lucy?
I put it down to too much Beethoven.
I heard her beautiful playing.
Miss Catharine, you have flowers in your hair.
Buongiorno, buongiorno, Ferdinando!
We salute thee.
The bronze came from Turkish cannons, captured by the Knights of San Stefano.
Come along.
Stop a minute. Let that man go on or I shall have to speak to him.
Oh, the British abroad!
I'd set an examination at Dover and turn back any tourists who failed.
Miss, this sepolcro not very good. You go see affresci di Giotto.
- Capella Peruzzi, Capella Bardivery good. - No, thank you.
Giotto scolaro di Cimabue. Kept the sheep on the mountain.
Make a picture of the sheep.
- No, thank you. - I very... good speak English.
- Do go away, please. - Capella Peruzzi, affresci di Giotto...
Cio tuttol
You see here these superb frescoes by Giotto, depicting the life of St Francis.
On the left, there he is, renouncing worldly goods.
And, on the right, the fourth Pope.
And here he is preaching to the bishops.
And there he is undergoing a... trial by fire before the Sultan.
And here...
Ah, Mr. Eager, good morning.
I'm leading a little private tour of my own.
Here he is on his deathbed, surrounded...
Mr. Eager is our English chaplain here in Florence.
...now unhappily ruined by restoration,
is untroubled by the snares of anatomy and perspective...
Look at that fat man! He must weigh as much as I do, but he's floating like a balloon.
Remember that Santa Croce was built by faith in the full fervor of medievalism.
Built by faith! That simply means the workers weren't paid properly!
Pardon me. The chapel is somewhat small. We will incommode you no longer.
Oh, I... Oh!
Mr. Eager, there's plenty of room for all of us. You don't have to...
Oh, dear.
Gather round, everybody.
You may observe here in the Peruzzi Chapel,
as well as in the place from which we've been expelled,
the special character of Giotto among the great painters.
He was practical...
My poor boy has brains, but he's very muddled.
But why should he be?
Well may you ask. But think how he's been brought up -
free from the superstition that leads men to hate in the name of God.
I must go...
I don't require you to fall in love with my boy, but please help him.
If only one could stop him from brooding.
And on what? The things of the universe.
I don't believe in this world sorrow. Do you?
No, I don't. Not at all, Mr. Emerson.
Well, there you are. Make my boy realize that,
at the side of the everlasting "why", there is a "yes".
And a "yes" and a "yes"!
Has your son no particular hobby?
I forget my worries at the piano,
and collecting stamps helped my brother.
Excuse me. My cousin will be most anxious if I don't get back.
- Poor girl. - Poor girl?
I think myself most fortunate. I'm very happy and having a splendid time.
Thank you very much. Goodbye.
Look at that adorable wine cart. How he stares at us, dear simple soul!
I love these little dark alleys.
They're all peasants, you know. Come along.
I do declare we're lost.
No, Miss Bartlett, you will not look into your Baedeker.
Two lone females in an unknown city, that's what I call an adventure.
We will simply drift.
One always has to be wide open. I think Miss Lucy is.
- Open to what, Miss Lavish? - To physical sensation.
I'll let you into a secret. I have my eye on your cousin.
For a character in your novel?
The young English girl, transfigured by Italy.
And why should she not be transfigured?
It happened to the Goths.
Signorina?
The smell!
A true Florentine smell. Inhale, my dear.
Deeper.
Every city, let me tell you, has its own smell.
Grazie.
How are you now?
Perfectly well. Absolutely well.
Then, let's go home.
There's no point in our stopping.
How very kind you've been. I can go alone. Thank you.
- My photographs! - What photographs?
I must have dropped them in the square. Would you be so kind...?
Miss Honeychurch!
You're not fit enough to go alone.
- I am. - No, you're not!
- But... - Then I don't get the photographs.
Besides, that way, you'd have to fly over the wall.
Sit down and don't move until I come back.
Isn't it extraordinary?
I mean, Italians are so kind, so lovable, and yet at the same time so violent.
Mr. Emerson?
I've never been so ashamed. I can't think what came over me.
It's perfectly natural. I nearly fainted myself.
Well, I owe you a thousand apologies.
And... I want to ask you a great favor.
You know how silly people are.
Gossiping.
Ladies especially, I'm afraid.
- You understand what I mean? - No.
I mean, would you not mention it to anyone, my foolish behavior.
What was that? I believe it was my photographs!
I didn't know what to do with them. They were covered with blood.
There. Now I've told you.
Something tremendous has happened.
Well, thank you... again.
How quickly accidents happen. Then one returns to the old life.
I don't.
I mean... something's happened to me.
And to you.
- No! - She is my sister.
- We ought not to allow this. - They're doing no harm.
You can't object in such a landscape.
As long as she is his sister.
So, Miss Honeychurch, you're traveling. As a student of art?
- No, I'm afraid not. - As a student of human nature like myself?
- I'm here as a tourist. - Indeed?
We residents sometimes pity you poor tourists not a little.
Handed about like parcels from Venice to Florence to Rome,
unconscious of anything outside Baedeker, anxious to get done and go on elsewhere.
I abhor Baedeker. I'd fling every copy in the Arno.
Towns, rivers, palaces, all mixed up in an inextricable whirl.
Over there, Miss Honeychurch,
the villa of my dear friend Lady Laverstock,
at present busy with a Fra Angelico definitive study.
And, on your left - no, just there -
Mr. Henry Burridge lives.
An American of the best type. So rare!
Doubtless you know his monographs in "Medieval Byways".
Your father, Mr. Emerson, is a journalist?
- He used to be. - He's retired? And you, yourself?
I'm on the railways.
You know the American girl in "Punch" who says to her father,
"Say, Poppa, what did we see in Rome?"
The father replies, "Guess Rome was where we saw the yellow dog."
Yellow dog!
There's traveling for you!
What?! Stop at once!
I'm not having this.
Ferma la carrozza subitol
Have we bolted?
What? Is Phaethon misbehaving with his Persephone?
- Please, I'll deal with them. - Leave them.
Do we find happiness so often that we should turn it away?
Scendal
Beauty!
Espoirl
Is that your son?
Could that be the silent, dour George?
He's saying his creed.
One more lump, if I might trouble you, Mr. Beebe.
Joy!
Beauty!
Joy...!
He's declaring the eternal "yes".
And a spoon, if there is one.
Love!
- What's that? - The gentlemen are doubtless having a game.
Why don't you join them, dear?
I want to stop here with you.
Observe my foresight. I never venture forth without my mackintosh squares.
At any time, one may have to sit on damp ground or cold marble.
Lucy, you have the other one.
Come on, I insist. The ground will do for me.
I have not had rheumatism for years, and if I feel a twinge I'll stand up.
And she never went back to Weybridge?
Her friend had to return without her. She remained at Monteriano.
And did she really...?
No, no. Don't be alarmed. This is not a cold.
Just a slight cough. I've had it for three days.
Nothing to do with sitting on the ground.
I shall go and find Mr. Beebe.
Oh, do, dear. He will be so pleased.
- Did she really marry this Italian? - In the church at Monteriano.
A youth. Ten years younger than herself.
Eleanor!
PUCCINI'S "CHI IL BEL SOGNO DI DORETTA" FROM "LA RONDINE")
Excuse me.
Dove Mr. Beebe?
Buoni uomini?
I think there is something in the Italian landscape
which inclines even the most stolid to romance.
It reminds me somewhat of the country around Shropshire.
Where I once spent a holiday at the home of my friend Miss Apesbury.
And I divine it, Charlotte. You had an adventure there.
Vain to deny it.
Lucy!
Mr. Eager, do come and join us. Miss Honeychurch is feeling unwell.
Andiamo.
Andiamol
George. George.
- Aren't you coming with us? - I'll walk.
Are you sure?
Courage, Miss Honeychurch, and faith.
Do you suppose this display is called into existence to extinguish you or me?
Even scientifically, the chances against being struck are enormous.
The steel knives that might attract the current are in the other carriage.
What is to be done?
How do you propose to silence him?
- The driver? - My dear girl, no. Mr. George Emerson.
I don't wish to be uncharitable, but I know he will talk.
He will not. He never talks.
One's lucky to get as much as a "yes" or "no" out of him.
Unfortunately, I have met the type before.
They seldom keep their exploits to themselves.
Exploits?
Very well. I'll speak to him.
Oh, no, my dear Lucy. I think it is for me to do that.
He should have been here at least an hour ago.
Don't stand there, dear. You will be seen from the outside.
The moment he comes, I shall face him.
No, my dear, you will do no such thing.
My poor dear girl, you are so young!
You've always lived among such nice people. You cannot realize what men can be.
This afternoon, if I had not arrived, what would have happened?
- I can't think. - Answer me, Lucia.
What would have happened had I not appeared?
You did appear!
Oh, I have vexed you at every turn.
It's true. I am too old for you. And too dull.
It will be a push to catch the morning train.
I have failed in my duty to your mother. She will never forgive me when you tell her.
Come away from the window!
She will certainly blame me when she hears of it.
Certainly.
And deservedly.
- Why need Mother hear of it? - Well, you tell her everything. Don't you?
I suppose I do, generally.
There's such a beautiful confidence between you.
One would hate to break it.
And, as I've said before, I am to blame.
I wouldn't want Mother to think so.
She will think so... if you tell her.
I shall never speak of it to Mother or anyone.
We'll both be as silent as the grave.
You'd better get to bed, dear. We have to make an early start.
But, of course, we have not had a full week.
I reserved them for a week like you wrote you wanted.
Yes, but we've only had half a week, so I calculate we owe you half the price.
I'm the loser. I could have let them rooms five times over.
Buonasera. Grazie.
Lucy! We must get packed immediately!
I wish to have a word with you, Mr. Emerson, in the drawing room, please.
- You shouldn't peep. - Cecil asked my permission,
but he can't manage without me.
- Nor me. - You?
- He asked my permission also. - Whatever did you say?
- I said no. - What?!
It's the way he put it - wouldn't it be a splendid thing for Lucy if he married her?
Wasn't I off my head with joy? So I said no, I wasn't.
Ridiculous child. You think you're so holy and truthful, but it's just conceit.
Look out!
I promessi sposel
- She has accepted me. - I'm so glad.
Dear Cecil, what joy!
- Well, welcome as one of the family. - Thank you.
- Mother? - Lucy.
Freddy!
- Mr. Beebe. - Thank you, Mary.
Hello, Mr. Vyse, I've come for tea. Do you suppose I shall get it?
Food is the one thing one does get here.
- What an extraordinary thing! - One of Freddy's bones.
He's terrible. A most unpromising youth. So unlike his sister.
You think his sister is promising?
I have a pet theory about Miss Honeychurch.
Is it not odd that she should play Beethoven with such passion and live so quietly?
I suspect that one day...
...music and life will mingle.
Then she will be wonderful in both.
I trust that day is at hand. She has just promised to marry me.
I'm sorry if I've given you a shock.
I'm awfully sorry. I'd no idea you were so intimate with her.
You should have stopped me. Shall we join the others?
Congratulations.
Blessings. Your vicar's benediction.
I want you to be supremely happy.
And supremely good, both as man and wife, mother and father.
And now I want my tea.
Just in time. How dare you be so serious!
- Summer Street will never be the same. - It's too small for anyone like ourselves.
It might attract the wrong type. The trains have improved so.
Fatal. What are five miles from the station these days?
Sir Harry, how about spinsters as tenants?
Most certainly! That is, if they are gentlewomen.
Indeed they are. Miss Teresa and Miss Catharine Alan. I met them in Italy.
Sir Harry, beware of these gentlewomen. Only let to a man.
Provided, of course, he's clean.
You'd love the Miss Alans.
I don't think I'd like anyone at that pensione.
Wasn't there a lady novelist and a free-thinking father and son?
I have no profession. My attitude - quite indefensible -
is that, if I trouble no one, I may do as I like.
It is, I dare say, an example of my decadence.
You're very fortunate. Leisure is a wonderful opportunity.
Don't slouch, Lucy. Go and talk to Mrs. Pool. Ask her about her leg.
Would Cecil and I be missed if we went for a walk?
I think it would be all right. Don't get your frock muddied.
It's disgusting the way an engagement is regarded as public property.
All those old women smirking.
One has to go through it. They won't notice us much next time.
But their whole attitude is wrong.
An engagement - horrid word in the first place -
is a private matter and should be regarded as such.
Oh.
- There's your philosophizing parson. - Don't you like Mr. Beebe?
I never said so. I consider him far above the average.
Mr. Beebe, I've had a wonderful idea.
I'm going to write to our Miss Alans and ask them to take Sir Harry's villa.
Sir Harry deserves a tenant as vulgar as himself.
Oh, Mr. Vyse, he's really very nice.
Gentlewomen! Yuck!
Acting the little god down here with his patronage
and his sham aesthetics, and everyone is taken in.
I'll write to them, and if you'd also send a word?
Certainly. A highly suitable addition to our little community.
Goodness, how cross you are!
It was that miserable tea party and all those dreadful people.
And not being alone with you.
Hmm.
Italy and London are the places where I feel I truly belong.
I am something of an Inglese Italianato.
E un diavolo incarnato. You know the proverb?
I somehow think you feel more at home with me in a room.
Never in the real country like this.
I think you're right. When I do think of you, it is always in a room.
This is the Sacred Lake.
Very picturesque, but hardly a lake. More of a puddle.
Freddy loves to bathe here. He's very fond of it.
And you?
I used to bathe here, too.
Until I was found out.
- Lucy. - Hmm?
Yes, I suppose we ought to be going.
I want to ask you something that I have never asked before.
What, Cecil?
Yes?
I have never kissed you.
No. You haven't.
May I now?
Well, of course you may, Cecil.
You might before. I can't run at you.
I'm sorry.
Mother's right. Those people Charlotte and I met at the pensione,
they were all rather extraordinary.
0ur neighbor and friend, Sir Harry 0tway,
has a villa in Summer Street for which he needs a tenant.
- I immediately thought of you. - "The house has the added attraction
"that it stands exactly across the road from the Reverend Beebe's church.
"I told him of my plan to lure you hither, and he is in complete agreement
"and says he is writing today to urge you to consider our little corner of Surrey.
"Yours sincerely, Lucy Honeychurch." There.
- Goodnight. - Goodnight.
Oh, dear.
- Goodnight. - Goodnight.
Goodnight. See you Friday.
- That will be all, Rose. Thank you. - Thank you, madam.
Goodnight, Rose.
Make Lucy one of us. Lucy's becoming wonderful.
Her music always was wonderful.
But she's purging off that Honeychurch taint. You know what I mean.
Not quoting the servants or asking how the pudding is made.
Mind you marry her next January.
Her music, the style of her...
how she kept to Schubert when, like an idiot, I wanted Beethoven.
Schubert was right for this evening.
Mother, I shall have our children educated just like Lucy.
Bring them up among honest country folk for freshness,
send them to Italy for... subtlety.
And not till then bring them to London.
Not a day beyond January.
Cecil... darling.
So, you do love me, little thing?
Lucy!
I want to show her this letter from the Miss Alans.
The tiresome Miss Alans. I hate their "if"-ing and "but"-ing.
Well, now they're really coming.
I had a letter from Miss Teresa asking how often the butcher called.
My reply impressed her favorably. Lucy?
Go for her. Get her round the shins.
- Freddy, be careful! - You really are savages, you know.
Impossible to make oneself heard. Don't you want to hear about the Miss Alans?
- Who? - Sir Harry's new tenants.
- That wasn't the name. - Wasn't whose name?
Sir Harry's tenants. I met him this morning and he said,
"I have procured desirable tenants."
I said, "Hurray," and slapped him on the back.
- Exactly. The Miss Alans. - More like Anderson.