Heavy sigh. My brother Howard just alerted me to the death of Julian Sands, who died at the age of 65 after months of having been missing. He went hiking alone in Southern California in January and some recently discovered human remains were just confirmed as being his.
He will forever be seared in my brain as the young man in *A Room With a View,* a movie that captivated me in my first year of college. I think I saw it four times. This clip is the high point of the movie. I'm pretty sure it was not only my first exposure to Sands, but also to Helena Bonham-Carter and Judi Dench. I'm pretty sure I was already familiar with Maggie Smith.
The kiss at the end of this scene is one of the most priceless moments in movies. The way Sands approaches Bonham-Carter - - such a purposeful yet unthreatening stride. And Bonham-Carter's body language, surprised but not exactly alarmed. We have Kiri te Kanawa singing a Puccini aria on the soundtrack ("Chi il bel sogno" from *La Rondine*) and it irks me that in this clip they cut off the end of the aria.
I KNOW! I WAS TOTALLY PISSED THEY DID THAT!