I'm MELTING! Katharine Hepburn's train is pulling into Venice!

[joeybee12]

Yes, I have "Summertime" on--a great film starring the world's greatest actress and one of the world's greatest directors (probably the greatest English-speaking director anyway), David Lean. God, have you ever been? When you go by train, you see the water, and a few glimpses of what's ahead (You really don't see Venice until you walk out of the train station) but you know it's coming, and this piece of the film really captures the excitement and anticipation in those few final miles!

[WI_DEM]

1. It's one of the great Hepburn films and performances

[joeybee12]

2. This and "The Lion in Winter" show just how incredible she was...

...in Summertime she is totally believable as a desperately lonely spinster, but then she's phenomenal as Eleanor, a queen who has known only wealth and privilege all her life.

[noonwitch]

7. "The Lion In Winter" is my all-time favorite movie

She has the best lines-actually, all the characters have great lines. Every character is perfectly cast, from Kate, to Peter O'Toole as Henry II, Anthony Hopkins as Richard, etc.

[joeybee12]

8. "Well, what family doesn't have its little ups and downs?"

Hilarious line, delivered perfectly, and I howl no matter how many times I hear it.

[terrya]

23. Ah.it's my favorite, also. "Why did I have to have such clever children?"

Just a pitch perfect film. The great, great score by John Barry makes it even more so...besides the reasons you've mentioned.

[joeybee12]

26. I'd hang you from the nipples, but you'd shock the children.

[terrya]

27. "Henry...I have a confession. I don't like our children"

I could quote these lines all night. :-)

[joeybee12]

30. Well, keep going! I gotta stop and go phone bank! Adios!

[terrya]

31. One more: "You'll spare the rod, you'll spoil those children"

Till later. :-)

[NashVegas]

12. I'll Be the Wet Blanket

Kate was great in this but oh, my! Did this movie launch a thousand clichés, or just follow them?

[joeybee12]

13. Wet? You're soaking wet!!!!!!!!!!!

Heartless so-and-so!

[NashVegas]

28. Yeah, Yeah

I know all about it :D

[joeybee12]

29. Good!

[nikatnyte]

3. Even today when your train pulls into the Venice station

it looks identical to that arrival scene in "Summertime". The best cinematic love letter to a city ever made!

[joeybee12]

6. He also captures the feeling and sight when she comes up St. Mark's

Square for the first time. It's the way it happened to me, walking down these narrow streets, not really sure where I was going, and then BAM! Right into the Square with all these people and the Basillica right in front of you. Breath-taking, and shocking at the same time, because it seems to have come out of nowhere!

[barb162]

11. YEAH, you got it!!!!

ANd then when you walk in St. Marks and you look at at the incredible gold mosaics on the walls and ceiling and that altar. And then the Doge's Palace. And you can't describe these buildings and this art and the photos don't do it justice. And you are filled with wonderment at it all and feel so lucky to be there!

[joeybee12]

14. You know what's really magnificent--those original horses that they

still have inside, up in the balcony, or whatever you call it. You can see them close up, and they are just wondrous. Everything about that place is incredible!

[DrZeeLit]

24. OOoh, last October, we arrived on the train....

.... I do so love Italy. Venice rocks. After dragging my husband all over Roma and Firenze, we just sat in Venice and ate and drank. I did vapretto all over -- Murano for glass is great. Jewelry.

Oooooo I want pasta for dinner.

[joeybee12]

25. My advice to people just arriving is to grab the #1 vaparetto--it's

the local that goes all through the canal and then to the Lido. Do this first--it's a great way to orient yourself to Venice!

[barb162]

4. I can't remember if I went in by train or water taxi but I remember

this ethereal view of this incredible city floating on the water. As if it weren't real. That's probably why I don't remember what conveyance I was even on, I was so transfixed by getting closer and closer to that city I had always wanted to be in. WHat a magnificent beautiful city. I was only there two days and I think I needed about a month. La Serenissima. I had all these pictures and things when I got back home trying to explain this city to other people and even with the pictures, I couldn't

[joeybee12]

5. I know, you have to see it to believe it! I think I'm going to book

a flight right now!!!!!!!!!

[barb162]

10. LOL, I don't blame you!!!! I want to go back there and also see so many

other places in Italy. I have been to Florence, Rome, Sienna, Milan,Lake Como, etc., twice now and I have never been in any of these places long enough. I want to see Padua, Assisi, Pompeii, more of the lake district near Switzerland, visit all of the thousands of hill towns....

Ah, but Venice.

[joeybee12]

16. I'm with you--bneen to most of the places you list, but Venice....

...I could just live there. It really does put you in a totally different and wonderful frame of mind!

[barb162]

18. I met a college kid from my alma mater who had spent her

junior year in Rome and Venice studying art when I was flying home the first time. SHe said she needed way more than a year in Venice as there was just so much STUFF there and although she had seen a lot of it, she just couldn't get to all of it. It just reminded me of all the places I had marked out, like a month's worth in 2 days. Oh well, gotta go there again.

[joeybee12]

21. I think you need a lifetime. Wish I had been around the turn of the

century--19th to 20th century, that is. Venice was in a decline around that time, and you could buy a palace for a song!

[barb162]

32. really? didn't know that, I know the population keeps shrinking

as they must get tired of that flooding. I guess most of the people you see there in the shops come in on the train every day. It has a really small population.
So anyway,the first time I was coming in on the train or water taxi, whatever it was, it was sunset. It was shining on the city from this low angle and the water was this incredible BLUE and it looked like something from heaven. I kid you not. Striaght out of Monet with the pastels of the sky and water and city at sunset. This city looked like it was just floating on the water like a miracle.

[joeybee12]

33. I'm not sure if it's shrinking anymore, but around that time--early 1900's

people had kind of abandoned Venice. I guess lots of places go out of style, butI think it was like with the English and all those castles being sold then as well--the upkeep was just too much, so people had to sell or leave, and there were few people who could afford a Venetian palace, or who wanted to. Seeing what a beautiful place it is, it's hard to fathom there being a time when Vennice was abandoned.

[Patiod]

17. I just got there this June, and was obsessed all summer

Still am obsessed, actually. I go here to get a fix when I need one:
http://veniceblog.typepad.com/veniceblog/

I need to go back there with my SO when it's cooler (it was gruesome hot). Agree with the "first glimpse" - it's amazing (Although someone was looking at my pictures, and there's one from the water taxi as it's coming into St. Mark's, and she said "oh, everyone has that picture.")

Walked around a lot at night, the place reeked of Jasmine (everyone told me to expect it to stink of the canals). Drank wine at a bar by the Rialto bridge and watched the city turn gold, and wanted to cry.

Another member of my Friends Meeting told me "it's the one place in the world that will exceed your expectations" and he was so right

[barb162]

19. I was there in April and nothing smelled. When you write reeked of

jasmine, I take it you mean it smelled good? Why did it smell of jasmine?

Thanks for the web site

I am always amazed that several hundred years ago these people escaped to live in these lagoons and then built that amazing city there. They had to haul everything from the mainland and then they built THAT.

[joeybee12]

20. Been there in January and September--great weather in Sept, but the smell

is slightly noticeable. Fog in January, but still wonderful.

[Patiod]

34. Reeked = positive (in this case)

In some areas (S.Stefano)where there was a lot of jasmine, it smelled like a perfume factory.

It was a lot like the honeysuckle is here in Pennsylvania in June...

[joeybee12]

22. Thanks for the link!

[The empressof all]

9. my greatest dream

During my honeymoon my greatest dream was to recreate the train pulling into Venice scene. I planned carefully and waited with intense anticipation. As we approached my husband began talking, and talking, and talking and wouldn't shut up!

Amost 20 years later we are still married but sometimes I do remember how fricken pissed I was with him for sucking my joy at the time.

[joeybee12]

15. Hey, in the middle of the night, kick him hard in the thigh, and when

he wakes up and asks what that was, you say, "What's what, dear? Go back to sleep, you're dreaming!"