''Darling'' is a 1965 British
romantic drama
Romance films or movies involve romantic love stories recorded in visual media for broadcast in theatres or on television that focus on passion, emotion, and the affectionate romantic involvement of the main characters. Typically their journey ...
film directed by
John Schlesinger
John Richard Schlesinger (; 16 February 1926 – 25 July 2003) was an English film and stage director. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for ''Midnight Cowboy'', and was nominated for the same award for two other films ('' Darling'' an ...
from a screenplay written by
Frederic Raphael
Frederic Michael Raphael (born 14 August 1931) is an American-British BAFTA and Academy Award winning screenwriter, biographer, nonfiction writer, novelist and journalist.
Early life
Raphael was born in Chicago, to an American Jewish mother f ...
. It stars
Julie Christie
Julie Frances Christie (born 14 April 1940) is a British actress. An icon of the Swinging Sixties, Christie is the recipient of numerous accolades including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. She ...
as Diana Scott, a young successful model and actress in
Swinging London
The Swinging Sixties was a youth-driven cultural revolution that took place in the United Kingdom during the mid-to-late 1960s, emphasising modernity and fun-loving hedonism, with Swinging London as its centre. It saw a flourishing in art, mus ...
, toying with the affections of two older men, played by
Dirk Bogarde
Sir Dirk Bogarde (born Derek Jules Gaspard Ulric Niven van den Bogaerde; 28 March 1921 – 8 May 1999) was an English actor, novelist and screenwriter. Initially a matinée idol in films such as ''Doctor in the House'' (1954) for the Rank Organ ...
and
Laurence Harvey. The film was shot on-location in
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
,
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
,
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
and
Shepperton Studios
Shepperton Studios is a film studio located in Shepperton, Surrey, England, with a history dating back to 1931. It is now part of the Pinewood Studios Group. During its early existence, the studio was branded as Sound City (not to be confused w ...
by cinematographer
Kenneth Higgins, with a musical score composed by
Sir John Dankworth.
The film premiered at the
4th Moscow International Film Festival on July 16, 1965, and was released theatrically in the United Kingdom on September 16 by
Anglo-Amalgamated
Anglo-Amalgamated Productions was a British film production company, run by Nat Cohen and Stuart Levy, which operated from 1945 until roughly 1971 (after which it was absorbed into EMI Films). Low-budget and second features, often produced at M ...
. It became a critical and commercial success, grossing $4.5 million and received five nominations at the
38th Academy Awards, including
Best Picture
This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards.
Best Actor/Best Actress
*See Best Actor#Film awards, Best Actress#F ...
, and won in three categories:
Best Actress
Best Actress is the name of an award which is presented by various film, television and theatre organisations, festivals, and people's awards to leading actresses in a film, television series, television film or play. The first Best Actress aw ...
(for Christie),
Best Original Screenplay
The Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is the Academy Award for the best screenplay not based upon previously published material. It was created in 1940 as a separate writing award from the Academy Award for Best Story. Beginning with the ...
, and
Best Costume Design. It also won four
BAFTA Awards
The British Academy Film Awards, more commonly known as the BAFTA Film Awards is an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) to honour the best British and international contributions to film. The cere ...
:
Best British Actor (Bogarde),
Best British Actress (Christie),
Best British Screenplay and
Best Art Direction (Black-and-White).
Plot
Diana Scott is a beautiful, bored young
model
A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure.
Models c ...
married to Tony Bridges. One day, Diana meets Robert Gold, a literary interviewer/director for television arts programs, by chance when she is spotted on the street by his roving film crew and interviewed by him about young people's views on convention. Diana is invited to watch the final edit in the TV studio, and it's there that their relationship starts. After liaisons in bleak hotel rooms, they leave their spouses (and, in Robert's case, children) and move into an apartment.
As a couple, they become part of the fashionable London media/arts set. Initially, Diana is jealous when Robert sees his wife while visiting his children, but she quickly loses this attachment when she mixes with the males of the media, arts, and advertising scene, particularly Miles Brand, a powerful advertising executive for the Glass Corporation who gets her a part in a trashy thriller after she has sex with him. The bookish Robert prefers the quiet life; it is he who now becomes jealous, but increasingly detached, depressed and lonely.
Diana attends a high-class charity draw for world hunger for which she is the face. The event, adorned by giant images of African famine victims is juxtaposed with wealthy guests behaving decadently and gorging themselves with food. Diana later becomes pregnant and decides to have an abortion to sustain her career.
She flies to Paris with Miles for more jet-set sophistication. There she finds the wild party, beat music, strip dance mind game, and cross-dressing vaguely repellent, but slowly adjusts and holds her own, gaining the respect of the crowd when she taunts Miles during the game. On her return to London, Robert calls her a whore upon discovering her affair with Miles and leaves her, for which she is not emotionally prepared. Miles, then, casts her as "The Happiness Girl" in the Glass Corporation's advertising campaign for a chocolate firm.
Diana finds comfort in the company of gay photographer Malcolm who has created her new famous look. They go shopping, where she randomly decides to shoplift multiple items. On location at a palazzo near Rome, Diana smiles in her medieval/Renaissance costume and completes "The Happiness Girl" shoot. She is taken with the beauty of the building and the landscape, getting on well with the prince, Cesare, who owns the palazzo. With the friendly Malcolm, Diana decides to stay in Italy. They stay in a simple house by a small harbor in Capri, where Diana flirts half-heartedly with Catholicism. They are visited by Cesare, who arrives at a huge launch, invites them on board, and proposes to Diana. She politely declines his proposal, but Cesare leaves the offer open.
Diana returns to London, still living in the flat she shared with Robert, where she has a party with Miles and other assorted media characters. Robert comes by to visit Diana but sees that she's with Miles and departs. Becoming disillusioned with Miles and the vacuous London jet set, Diana flirts with the Catholic church again. Impulsively, she flies to Italy and marries the prince, which proves to be ill-fated. Though waited on hand and foot by the servants, she is almost immediately abandoned in the vast palazzo by Cesare, who visits Rome frequently.
Diana flees to London to visit Robert, who charms her into bed, making her believe they are ready for a stable, long-term relationship. However, in the morning, he tells her that he's leaving her and that he fooled her only as an act of revenge. He reserves a flight to Rome, packs her into his car, and takes her to Heathrow airport to send her back to her life as Princess Della Romita. At the airport, Diana is hounded by the press, who address her as Princess. She boards the plane to leave.
Cast
Production
According to
Richard Gregson
Richard John Gregson (5 May 1930 – 21 August 2019) was a British talent agent, film producer and screenwriter.
Career
Gregson spent his early career working in America, alongside stars such as Robert Redford, Julie Christie, Alan Bates and ...
, agent for
John Schlesinger
John Richard Schlesinger (; 16 February 1926 – 25 July 2003) was an English film and stage director. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for ''Midnight Cowboy'', and was nominated for the same award for two other films ('' Darling'' an ...
, the budget was around £300,000 and was entirely provided by
Nat Cohen
Nat Cohen (23 December 1905 – 10 February 1988)William D. Rubinstein, et al (eds.''The Palgrave Dictionary of Anglo-Jewish History'' Palgrave Macmillan, 2011, p.171 was a British film producer and executive. For over four decades he was one of t ...
at
Anglo-Amalgamated
Anglo-Amalgamated Productions was a British film production company, run by Nat Cohen and Stuart Levy, which operated from 1945 until roughly 1971 (after which it was absorbed into EMI Films). Low-budget and second features, often produced at M ...
.
Shirley MacLaine originally was cast as Diana,
but was replaced by Christie. Production on ''Darling'' commenced in August 1964 and wrapped in December.
[Box office / business for ''Darling''](_blank)
at the Internet Movie Database
IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, ...
It was filmed on location in London, Paris, and Rome.
[Filming Locations for ''Darling''](_blank)
at the Internet Movie Database
IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, ...
The Romita palazzo was portrayed by the Medici villa in
Poggio a Caiano
Poggio a Caiano is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Prato, Tuscany region Italy. The town, birthplace of Philip Mazzei, lies south of the provincial capital of Prato.
Sister towns
Poggio a Caiano has two sister cities:
* Charlottesvi ...
. The final scene was shot at
Heathrow Airport
Heathrow Airport (), called ''London Airport'' until 1966 and now known as London Heathrow , is a major international airport in London, England. It is the largest of the six international airports in the London airport system (the others be ...
in London.
In 1971, ''
New York'' magazine wrote of
mod fashion and its wearers: "This new, ''déclassé'' English girl was epitomized by Julie Christie in ''Darling''—amoral, rootless, emotionally immature, and apparently irresistible."
Reception
Despite receiving many awards at the time of release, the film later developed a mixed reputation. In his ''
New Biographical Dictionary of Film'' entry on Schlesinger,
David Thomson writes that the film "deserves a place in every archive to show how rapidly modishness withers. Beauty is central to the cinema and Schlesinger seems an unreliable judge of it, over-rating Christie and rarely getting close enough to the action to make a fruitful stylistic bond with it". ''
Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide
''Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide'' was a book-format collection of movie capsule reviews that began in 1969, was updated biannually after 1978, and then annually after 1986. The final edition was published in September 2014. It was originally calle ...
'' described it as a "trendy, influential '60s film – in flashy form and cynical content".
Tony Rayns
Antony Rayns (born 1948) is a British writer, commentator, film festival programmer and screenwriter. He wrote for the underground publication ''Cinema Rising'' (its name inspired by Kenneth Anger's '' Scorpio Rising'') before contributing to ...
though, in the ''
Time Out Film Guide
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to c ...
'', is as damning as Thomson. For him, the film is a "leaden rehash of ideas from
Godard,
Antonioni
Michelangelo Antonioni (, ; 29 September 1912 – 30 July 2007) was an Italian filmmaker. He is best known for directing his "trilogy on modernity and its discontents"—''L'Avventura'' (1960), ''La Notte'' (1961), and ''L'Eclisse'' (1962 ...
and Bergman", although with nods to the "Royal Court school", which "now looks grotesquely pretentious and out of touch with the realities of the life-styles that it purports to represent."
On the
review aggregator
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
website
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, ''Darling'' holds an approval rating of 67% from 18 reviews, with an average rating of 7.1/10.
Box office
The film was a commercial success, grossing $12 million at the worldwide box office against a budget of only £400,000. It earned $4 million in
theatrical rentals.
According to
Richard Gregson
Richard John Gregson (5 May 1930 – 21 August 2019) was a British talent agent, film producer and screenwriter.
Career
Gregson spent his early career working in America, alongside stars such as Robert Redford, Julie Christie, Alan Bates and ...
, the film only earned £250,000 in the United Kingdom, but Nat Cohen sold the U.S. rights to
Joe E. Levine
Joseph Edward Levine (September 9, 1905 – July 31, 1987) was an American film distributor, financier and producer. At the time of his death, it was said he was involved in one or another capacity with 497 films. Levine was responsible for the ...
for $900,000 and made a profit – and the film was more successful in the U.S.
Accolades
See also
*
BFI Top 100 British films
In 1999, the British Film Institute surveyed 1,000 people from the world of British film and television to produce a list of the greatest British films of the 20th century. Voters were asked to choose up to 100 films that were "culturally British". ...
References
External links
*
*
*
*
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Darling (Film)
1965 films
1960s British films
1960s English-language films
1965 romantic drama films
British black-and-white films
British romantic drama films
Films about fashion in the United Kingdom
Films about modeling
Films directed by John Schlesinger
Films featuring a Best Actress Academy Award-winning performance
Films scored by John Dankworth
Films set in London
Films set in Paris
Films set in Rome
Films shot in London
Films shot in Paris
Films shot in Rome
Films shot in Tuscany
Films that won the Best Costume Design Academy Award
Films whose writer won the Best Original Screenplay Academy Award