Dutch in Seven Lessons (1948)

• 72%
• 1948
• Comedy
• Documentary
• Heinz Josephson
• Charles Huguenot van der Linden
• Wam Heskes
• Audrey Hepburn
• A. Viruly

Nearly 60 years after its completion, this Dutch production is chiefly known as the film that marked Audrey Hepburn's debut in a professional motion picture. Descriptions of the move have ranged from "a second-feature comedy" to "a travelogue of the Netherlands," with records of its length varying from thirty-nine to seventy-nine minutes. Reportedly, the former is correct, which makes it what is best known in the trade as a "featurette," designed to supplement the main attraction in cinemas of its late-forties era. Today, any such production would most likely be included as a DVD supplement. At eighteen, Audrey was thrilled to be acting in a motion picture, and to be paid fifty guilders for doing so. Understandably, director Charles van der Linden would proudly claim that it was he, not the British or Hollywood filmmakers, who had actually "discovered" Audrey Hepburn!