Leopard in the Snow

I saw Leopard in the snow in 1978 as an 18 yr old and was lucky enough to purchase a copy of the book with the movie pictures in the middle. I have re-read the book countless times in the last 28 years, Helen and Dominic are like old friends to me. Last month on a whim I put Leopard in the Snow into eBay and there it was available on DVD and now I have it in my hot little hands after 28 years.

And after 28 years the movie was just as I remembered. Heart-warming, romantic and with terrible hair and clothes. But who cares! This is a movie you'll either love or hate and if you loved the innocence of 1960/1970's Mills & Boon books, chances are you'll love Leopard in the Snow.

This is one of those movies that lingers in your memory long after you've seen it. It's a gentle kind of romance that shows how Fate can strike with misfortune yet in time turn it around to have a positive outcome.

At the start young Helen James (Susan Penhaligon) is caught in a heavy snowstorm while driving. Luckily she is rescued and brought to the house in which former race car driver Dominic (Keir Dullea) lives very much in seclusion and helped only by his close friend, Bolt (Jeremy Kemp). Slowly she learns about Dominic's anguished past and grows to love him but he is still too much caught up in his past grievous memories and isn't ready to face the future. Helen leaves, returns to her home and confronts her father, Sir Philip (Kenneth More), with her dilemma, eventually realizing she can't go on with her usual life as others expect her to. As they say, "The course of true love never does run smooth," and so it is here.

By the way, there's a pet leopard being kept by Dominic in the wintry, scenic setting, hence the title of the movie.

I often wished this movie was available on video and finally after long, long waiting I've been lucky to acquire the DVD!

A heartwarming tale for the romantics.

Over twenty five years after I endured this film in a Sheffield cinema it still sticks in my mind as the worst film I have ever seen. In fact I use it as a yardstick to measure anything I watch on TV or in the cinema even now. The plot was banal, the acting atrocious and the set didn't fool me for a minute.

I remain intrigued, to this day, as to how the lead actress managed to struggle to a remote hotel in a snowstorm, with nothing but what she stood up in, yet managed to appear in every scene thereafter in a completely new outfit. A chick-flick without the benefit of a decent soundtrack.

If you have an IQ of greater than, say, 75 I beg you not to watch it. I am not surprised it has never been brought out on DVD or video.

I'm particularly fond of this movie because the book was the first Harlequin romance I ever read, and I was lucky to get the movie edition with the photos in the center. At first Keir Dullea was not my idea of a Harlequin hero (I kept seeing him as David in David and Lisa), but he did grow on me and he does play the bitter recluse to perfection. Susan Penaglion is a wonderful heroine, and when she was in the Britcom "A Fine Romance" years later her character's name was 'Helen.' Nice. I have a few quibbles with some of the changes made for the movie, which I suspect were Jill Hyem's ideas, to make the plot more, I don't know, logical to non-romance readers. What I love best about the movie is that it is done absolutely straight, with no tongue in cheek or "it's just a silly romance novel" attitude. Try ebay for a copy and luck may strike; it did for me.

Having read Anne Mathers Book I had to see this movie and was not disappointed Keir Duller and the rest of the cast carried this movie really well following the plot of the book very closely i came out of the cinema with a real feel good attitude. It's a real pity that this movie is unavailable on video or dvd i for one could do with a bit of feel good factor when i need it. The Leopard was really good too.