Daisy Miller

Don't let the first 10 minutes fool you, this movie is tremendous. Shepherd might seem off putting at the start, but she fully takes hold of the character and Brown's sad eyes do more to sell the story than anything. Sure it's set in a bygone age, but the feelings are totally universal and the ending is just devastating. This is totally unfairly passed over and deserves more attention. It's every bit as good as Barry Lyndon, just in a different way.

I agree with the above comments. Miss Shepherd's simpering performance sabotaged what was otherwise a very good film. Subtle, amusing in all the right places and well-directed by Peter Bogdanovich. Unfortunately Bogdanovich was so taken with Cybill Shepherd he failed to see that she was wrong for the part. She is outshone by a brilliant supporting cast including Cloris Leachman as the weak-willed mother and Eileen Brennan as a spiteful society woman. Henry James has never transferred well to the screen; one thinks of the disastrous "Portrait Of A Lady" where Nicole Kidman was colourless as Isabel Archer. This is about the best of the movies adapted from James (perhaps with the exception of "The Heiress" which was an adaptation of "Washington Square") and it benefits from its' sumptuous location photography - it was filmed in Switzerland and Rome.

I strongly disagree with the limited, parochial, and dismissive comments of other reviewers' comments. Daisy Miller is a superb and literal adaptation of the Henry James novella. It is still a joy to watch and enjoy this period piece which is perfectly cast. I completely agree with Orson Welles that Cybill Shepherd was born to play Daisy Miller. Her performance is effortless and she aptly embodies Daisy in both looks and spirit. Bogdanovich was right on the mark with the casting of Ms. Shepherd. While it is true she was his girl friend at the time, it is also true that she was perfect for the role. Her interpretation involves rushing through the dialogue as if she couldn't wait for a response so she in turn could reply and in this case it is exactly what Daisy would have done. Cybill Shepherd was at the apex of her beauty and talent in Daisy Miller. She had just starred in three great American films-Last Picture Show, Heartbreak Kid, and Taxi Driver. Daisy Miller could easily be considered along with the three aforementioned film. When I am bored with high tech films, loud action adventure films, and post modern films, I often return with great pleasure to the sumptuous and beautifully realized Daisy Miller.

Many reviewers here seem to have confused the story and characters with the film and the actors.

Yes, Daisy in the film is rather flat and monotonous. But that's a high compliment -- that the ravishing Cybill Shepherd could so accurately portray such a flat character. Henry James at one point describes Daisy's expression as a "light, slightly monotonous smile", in another her voice as a "little soft, flat monotone". He says late in the story that "there was always, in her conversation, the same odd mixture of audacity and puerility". No, she wouldn't be a very pleasant person to be around for long. But that was part of James's point: that our attraction to people (especially those of the opposite sex) often defies reason. Shepard makes the point well.

Some have commented that they wished the story had been filled out. Some of those apparently haven't read the story. One of those critics even places the story wrong by forty years. Though called a novella, it's barely more than a short story. In fact the film does a remarkable job of portraying the events and (more importantly) the characters very much as they are in the story. The great majority of the dialog in the film is verbatim from the story.

In some instances, the scenes and characters were significantly expanded from the James story. How far should a director go, if the aim is to film a classic story, not just to make something derived from that story? James's characters were pretty flat, a lot flatter than those in the film. One could justifiably criticize the film for telling the story far better than James did.

Do you think James's story is dated and flat in the modern world? Well, in many ways so do I. A polemical assault on discrimination based on manners and birth is truly dated. Yet an assault on personal discrimination remains fully current. The modern world is certainly not devoid of personal discrimination. Perhaps it's not often so ugly, not in the first world anyway, but prejudice is very much alive.

James's story is also unsubtle: two groups of people with differing views, one person caught with one foot in each camp, unhappy results. That's about it. Should one film the classic story, or build something different? It's a choice; great films have been made both ways. The choice for this film was unambiguous: to film the classic story.

The photography is truly gorgeous -- the film (at least the outdoor parts) was shot on location in Vevey, Switzerland and Rome, Italy. Despite the long stretches of dialog, including Daisy's run-on commentaries, one need not strain to understand the words. If the story were as good as the production and acting (several good performances) then this would be a 10. The faithfulness to the original weights it down.

Had this movie been free standing or based on a different book, it could have turned into a dramedy, and been a more cheerful story. As it was, the scenery was stunning, the costumes wonderful, and Cybil Shepherd deserves a lot of credit for her portrayal of Annie ("Daisy") Miller, the flirtatious, free-spirited American girl who's innocently trying her wings in Europe, unwittingly getting a not-so-innocent reputation. Her acting was great (and if she managed to say all those rapid-fire lines in the beginning without resorting to cue cards, she deserved an Oscar just for that), she looked stunning in the 19thc dresses, and she had a very nice singing voice, too.

Bary brown did a good job as her bewildered suitor, Winterbourne, who can't quite figure out what sort of girl she really is, and gets more than enough advice about her, whether welcome or not.

Duilio Del Prete, who played Winterbourne's rival, Giovanelli, played his part well, and had quite an operatic voice, as well. There are some familiar faces here, like Chloris Leachman, who plays Daisy's nervous, rather airheaded mother, while the famous Mildred Natwick is Winterbourne's aunt, who tries to make him see Daisy's unsuitability as a potential wife, as does Eileen Brennan, who plays social leader Mrs. Walker, whose word can make or break anyone wishing to climb the social ladder.

Do you trust your instincts and listen to your heart, or do you take appearances at face value and think with your head, while listening to those who apparently know? Or do they???