5/5 A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes...
  by Kenneth A. Nelson (Pensacola, FL)
Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. Girl and Boy fall in love. Simple, basic plot, huh?

Into the equation, add: very young girl and boy, add Paris and Venice, add sincerity, warmth and sincerity, youthful enthusiasm and the cutest couple in recent years (a Partridge in a Pear Tree is optional).

Was I ever that young and hopeful? I doubt it very much, but I feel like I am, every time I watch this film. Watching and "visiting" with Sir Laurence Oliver (the old Con Man) is a treat and a pathway embeded with emotional rememberances of years gone by.

A Beautiful Film...

5/5 A Screen Legend, a Star's Debut, and Europe!
  by Benjamin J Burgraff (Las Vegas)
I think every great director makes at least one light-hearted 'fun' film set in a romantic, far-away location; Hitchcock extolled the Riviera's virtues in "To Catch a Thief", Ford created a fantasy isle using Kaua'i in "Donovan's Reef", Hawks, in "Hatari", offered Tanganyika as a safari-lover's dream...and George Roy Hill displays an enchanting vision of 1970's Paris, Verona, and Venice, in "A Little Romance".

While the story is certainly breezy and light (a teenaged French boy and American girl, aided by an aging, endearing French pickpocket, run away from their Parisian homes to take a romantic pledge in Venice), the presence of Laurence Olivier as the elderly crook gives the character a charm few actors could match. Equally impressive is 14-year-old Diane Lane, making her film debut; radiantly beautiful (Olivier called her a "young Grace Kelly"), Lane, under Hill's direction, eschews the 'typical' teenager mannerisms, displaying the warmth and maturity that has been her trademark for 30 years. Her French boyfriend, portrayed by 15-year-old Thelonious Bernard (in his debut, as well), is also terrific, as a quick-thinking fan of American cinema. It's a shame he only made one other feature, before leaving acting to become a dentist.

The story shines with wonderful secondary characters and droll inside jokes. Hill's choice of Sally Kellerman and Arthur Hill as Lane's parents is inspired; Kellerman's screen persona as a self-centered flake, and Hill's, as a warm paternal figure, were so well-established that the director could devote more screen time developing other characters, from David Dukes as a preening young film director (channeling Bogdanovich, Rydell, and Richard Donner), to grizzled Broderick Crawford, portraying himself as a hard-drinking skirt-chaser who can't remember his co-stars from the past. Hill even slides in clips from his greatest successes, "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "The Sting" (which puts Lane and Bernard to sleep!)

"A Little Romance" is timeless fun, at a wonderful price, and it's a film you can enjoy, again and again!



5/5 Delightful
  by Reader (U.S.A.)
This movie was so well like that I sent it to my grandaughters - 13 and 20. My husband liked it too!!

1/5 For all the 5 star ratings, I was surprised at some of the content in this movie.
  by C. Johnson
For all the 5 star ratings that this movie has, I was surprised by some of the content. The children drink and become drunk to celebrate a birthday, dance inappropriately, look at pornography, sneak into adult movies and comment on an explicit love scene and swear all the time. There are never any consequences shown for any of this behavior or other bad choices made by the children and the adults of the movie. Though the story line seems cute and innocent, this movie is not a good role model for children and not worthwhile for adults either.

5/5 A Romance to remember.
  by Desperate N Conneticut (everywhere ct usa)
It was great.... I watched it with my husband and my eleven year old granddaughter and we all loved it... it is now her movie. It was truly adorable. Great performances by all and a great ending.