In my notes I wrote: "She's got a lot of 'splaining to do." This whole movie is about manners. "I have some things I must tell you," she says, and the camera moves outside on the lawn, and we see them through a window as they talk. And then Sir Edgar returns for his answer. Mary is prepared to betray a confidence of the Principessa to help Rowley. The local Fascist Party chief (Massimo Ghini) threatens legal action against Rowley. A hint or two: Mary turns to Rowley to help her out of a fix. She takes pity on him and brings him into her bed, where, inspired by the Principessa's story, she gives him such a night to remember that she is still wearing her pearls in the morning. He is Karl Richter ( Jeremy Davies), an Austrian refugee from Hitler. He responds insolently, she slaps him and dumps him, and on the way home, picks up a pathetic little unshaven violinist she saw in a restaurant. Once, says the Principessa (Bancroft delivering this confidence at the end of a virtuoso monologue as they walk in the garden), she made love recklessly for a single night with a risky young man, just for the fun of it.Īt the Principessa's table in a restaurant that night, Mary is seated next to a brash, rich American named Rowley Flint ( Sean Penn). She doesn't love Sir Edgar-but what, asks the Principessa, does love have to do with it? In a frank heart-to-heart, the Principessa explains that she married for security and took lovers for entertainment, although sex, she sighs, supplies you in old age with neither the fond memories nor the security of wealth. Mary's adviser on this possibility is the Principessa San Ferdinando ( Anne Bancroft), who has a town house thanks to a rich Italian husband, now dead, "so ugly he frightened the horses." Sir Edgar's is an attractive offer for Mary. Soon he will be named governor of Bengal Mary would become the first lady of British society in Calcutta. He is tall, slender, will not see 60 again and has manners that make you want to sit very still. An old friend named Sir Edgar Swift ( James Fox) has just journeyed over from Cannes to propose marriage to her. Now she depends on the kindness of friends. Her husband drank up and gambled away their money and himself. The villa of the title is occupied by a temporary guest, Mary Panton ( Kristin Scott Thomas), a pretty widow in her mid-30s.
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