WORLD ENTERTAINMENT/PROFILE OF A STAR                                                    From the Desk of  Maximillien de Lafayette, Veronica McLaughlin and Martha Griffin.

Joining forces, imbibed with hard work, sacrifices and strong determination,  Rose and Cary team has succeeded in producing a splendid piece of cinema, a superb film which brought so much beauty, human warmth and cinematographic excellence to contemporary American cinema. Although, some reviews were not very positive, the overwhelming articles, reviews and critiques of the film were favorable and to a certain degree, quite glowing and warm like the spirit and character of Isabel Rose.

But to bring back the "half-dead nostalgia" of Hollywood 20s, 30s, and 40s, demands enormous resources, cinematographic veracity, research, documentation, authentic dance choreography of the era and the romantic musical aura of a sweet-bitter epoch! Cary came to the rescue. He said: "This is where a great producer, a brilliant creative team and a remarkable crew come in handy. I had Horacio Marquinez, our Director of Photography, and Cecil Gentry, our production designer, sit with me and watch THE RED SHOES, FUNNY FACE, SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN, and THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBURG.  And we all knew BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S. We talked about the look of a Douglas Sirk melodrama, Billy Wilder’s work in color, and everything Vincent Minnelli ever did.  I wanted to go for this Technicolor look so we shot on slow film with a lot of light in very color-saturated locations.  We color-coded characters, keeping one lead in a blue-gray world, another in a warmer, more red-based palette, and yet another in greens and browns—all tactics used by the Freed Unit at MGM between about 1944 and 1958.  And then we looked for New York locations, any of which had what I called “1953 tourist-Manhattan” appeal, like the fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel, the windows at Saks Fifth Avenue, Times Square, and the promenade along the Hudson in Riverside Park.  Our line producer, Valerie Romer, got us a substantial lighting package for a reasonable price so we lit every exterior like it was a soundstage. The fun was in making these New York locations look like we built them on a set or shot them on a back lot, which is how it would’ve been done in the old days. LOVE is a low-budget indie but you can still throw a lot of lavender light on the fountain in Grand Army Plaza, do a wet-down, pray for good weather and make a little magic happen.  New York has a lot of grit, but there’s plenty of glamour there, too." Cary was a performer with the Joffrey II Ballet and started dancing when he was eleven. He  felt confident he could choreograph the elaborate dance sequences himself.

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