The Audrey Hepburn Story
The film spans from Hepburn's early childhood to the 1950s which details her life as a Dutch ballerina, coming to grips with her parents' divorce, and enduring life in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands during World War II. She then settles in the U.S. where she succeeds in making it big as a movie actress, in such movies as Breakfast at Tiffany's.
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- Cast:
- Jennifer Love Hewitt , Frances Fisher , Keir Dullea , Gabriel Macht , Peter Giles , Emmy Rossum , Eric McCormack
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Reviews
Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful
Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.
A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."
The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.
I have almost every Audrey Hepburn movie ever made , just ordered Robin and Marian. There will never be another Audrey Hepburn and no actress could ever compare to her just ordered the Hollywood Collection of Audrey Hepburn remembered. It is excellent it goes into the whole story of her entire life. They don't make women like this anymore sad to say, she had class. Jennifer Love Hewitt did all right but no one can compare to the original.
What I can never understand is why an American is chosen to play the part of someone who had a pristine British accent and vice versa. (I know Hepburn was born in Belgium). This movie reminds me somewhat of the now legendary role Dick Van Dyke played (Bert) in Mary Poppins. His cockney accent was to say the least 'atrocious'.Although I must say that the British accent of Jennifer Love Hewitt was better than Van Dykes's it still left a lot to be desired.SPOILER BEGINS This movie charts 'part' of the life of Audrey Hepburn who was in my opinion one of the most beautiful women in the world. That is not to say that Love Hewitt is not stunningly attractive.The movie takes us from her very young age, through WW2 when she was taken to live in Holland where her parents thought she would be safe but of course it turned out that she was raised in German occupied Holland, up to the period when she was one of the most sought after stars in the movie world.I must say that I learned a lot about Audrey Hedpburn watching this movie. For example she actually helped the Dutch underground when she was in Holland and she witnessed the atrocities the Hitler Army was capable of.However, the movie did not go far enough and in my opinion the latter part of her life should have been covered also. She worked tirelessly for UNICEF for several years, right up to her relatively untimely death in 1993 of Appendiceal cancer. This was a two part mini-series and I feel that they could have made a three part series in order to cover her later life.There was only a brief written reference to this in the end credits.SPOILER ENDS I do like Jennifer Love Hewitt as an actress having first seen her in the bittiest of bit parts in Sister Act 2 and then in the popular TV series Ghost Whisperer.It is simply that I feel that she was very wrongly cast in the role of Audrey Hepburn because her English accent was simply not up to it.Had the part of Hepburn be played by someone else (a Brit) and had the whole story been told I feel that the movie would have been wonderful. Even if Jennifer had not tried to emulate an English accent and used her American accent I feel this would have been better.Love Hewitt was Producer & Co Executive Producer of Ghost Whisperer and she was also one of the Co Executive Producers of The Audrey Hepburn Story so I am wondering if that was the reason she played the title role.For the most part the remainder of the cast played their roles extremely well, especially Francis Fisher who played Audrey's mother Ella van Heemstra. She was nothing like the hateful woman Ruth Dewitt Bukater in Titanic.I also liked the way Eric McCormack played Mel Ferrer. He too was nothing like the despicable Ray Summers in Dead Like Me.All in all I feel that the Audrey Hepburn Story could have been a great deal better but nevertheless I will say it is still quite watchable.This mini-series was nominated for one award, the Golden Reel Award, for Best Sound Editing, which it did not win.
I must admit that after reading all of the reviews to be horrified by JLH presentation as Audrey Hepburn. But I was somewhat surprised. I didn't think that she was the best actress available, I think Emmy Rossum should have played Audrey the entire movie, but JLH does an alright job. She doesn't do the perfect accent, but then I don't think that any actress could do the accent perfectly. I never knew of the horrible things that happened to Audrey during her life and this movie made me cry, especially during Emmy's scenes. I have such respect for Audrey Hepburn now. The work she did made such a difference and it's sad that she is gone now.
Jennifer Love Hewitt's portrayal of Audrey is the real problem in this movie. She made Audrey look like a spineless sap who was unbelievably sweeter-than-sugar and modest, almost clueless as to the real world. The way the movie made Audrey seem obsessive about having a baby was also really awful. I also think a more well-rounded view of Audrey's life, including the strained relationship with her mother and Mel Ferrer's cheating on her, not to mention her life after Breakfast at Tiffany's, would have made this movie into something worthwhile to watch. I understand that this was not a biography, but why make a movie that is completely false, when the dramatization doesn't add anything special to the story?