I Am a Camera (film)

I Am a Camera
Region 2 DVD cover
Directed byHenry Cornelius
Screenplay byJohn Collier
Based onThe Berlin Stories
by Christopher Isherwood (book)
I Am a Camera
by John Van Druten (play)
Produced byJohn Woolf
Starring
CinematographyGuy Green
Edited byClive Donner
Music byMalcolm Arnold
Production
company
Distributed byIndependent Film Distributors
Release date
  • 21 July 1955 (1955-07-21)[1]
Running time
98 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
Box office£144,666 (UK)[2]

I Am a Camera is a 1955 British comedy-drama film based on the 1945 book The Berlin Stories by Christopher Isherwood and the 1951 eponymous play by John Van Druten. The film is a fictionalized account of Isherwood's time living in Berlin between the World Wars. Directed by Henry Cornelius, from a script by John Collier, I Am a Camera stars Laurence Harvey as Isherwood and Julie Harris recreating her Tony Award-winning performance as Sally Bowles.

Censors in both the United Kingdom and United States demanded considerable emendations to the film which led to significant deviations from the source material by Van Druten and Isherwood. Although critically unsuccessful upon its release, the film became a smash hit at the 1955 British box office.[3][4] Long overshadowed by Cabaret, the 1966 stage and 1972 film adaptation of the same source material, contemporary critics have noted the historic interest of this earlier presentation.

  1. ^ Mayer, p. 200
  2. ^ Vincent Porter, 'The Robert Clark Account', Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, Vol 20 No 4, 2000 p506
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference Screen Magazine 1955 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Kinematograph Weekly 1955 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).