Directed by Ernst Lubitsch
Written by Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett
1938/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel
Nicole de Loiselle: Here’s to our agreement. No lovemaking. No quarrels.
Michael Brandon: Just like an ordinary married couple.
Nicole de Loiselle: I said no quarrels.
What do you get when you mix a screenplay by Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett with direction by Ernst Lubitsch and two utterly charming leads? Comedy gold.
Michael Brandon (Gary Cooper) is a stern, eccentric multi-millionaire. Nicole de Loiselle (Claudette Colbert) is the daughter of a penniless marquis (Edward Everett Horton). The two meet cute at a department store where Michael is attempting to buy a pajama top for half the price of a set of pajamas. Nicole is game to buy the bottoms. It is love (or something) at first sight for Michael, he relentlessly pursues her, and they fall in love.
On their wedding day, Nicole discovers he has been married seven times before. He claims it is all right because he gives his discarded wives $50,000 a year after the divorce. Nicole is dismayed but for the sake of her father negotiates $100,000 a year. Michael happily agrees. But Nicole has no intention of ever collecting and takes him for a ride while she tames him. With David Niven as Michael’s secretary and Nicole’s erstwhile suitor.
I enjoyed this. It is possibly the last of Lubitsch’s American films that I had left to see. Wilder’s script is a scream and the leads are adorable. Cooper is so good at this kind of deadpan comic character and Colbert, as usual, is warm, natural, mischievous, and sexy. Horton is also a highlight. Recommended.
Thanks, I’ll….what!!! I have this but it’s unwatched!!! To be remedied immediately…but Cooper doesn’t seem to fit…but Bea says to check it out…confusion!
Gary Cooper is actually very good in comedies. He is usually deadpan and slightly befuddled. For two other excellent performances try Lubitsch’s “Design for Living” and Howard Hawks’s “Ball of Fire”.
Thanks for the tips _ I rememder liking “Design for Living”, can’t remember “Ball of Fire” (oh it’s another one squirrelled away, unwatched!) Unlike your excellent self I rarely remember salient points, DOH….will now be leaving Japan for a screwball-athon – my wife will be delighted LOL, she doslikes sins and the Japanish touch to cinema LOL – she liked Bluebeard – my thoughts = “good but could be better. The bggest hinderance I had before watching was “Cooper in a silly comedy….noooo”*. After watching I have to say “don’t let that put you off” – though I’m sure that Powell or Grant would have done better, this is well written enough (or GC is talented enough) that it works and, though uneven, produces smiles and even laughs. Not the best of it’s era (and that obvious back projection!!) it’s still of a time when Hollywood comedies were unmatchable.”
* I’d have thought the same re Clarke Gable yet he’s a revalation in the not to be missed “It Happened One Night” but I’d forgotten, again DOH.
CORRECTION
“she doslikes sins” should read “she dislikes subs”
Good to see I’m not the only one you proofread! Don’t get me wrong I am grateful for it. My husband seems to have a lot in common with your wife. No subs, no counterculture, no depressing movies. We watch a film together each night to wind down before he goes to sleep. By the way, I have an Instagram account @flickersintime where I post on the movies I have seen the previous day. If I have reviewed a movie here I don’t review again on the blog. But you can find all the screwball comedies I’ve seen this month there. From late October through the end of November, I was watching film noir. I mostly post my reviews from the blog for movies I have seen before but include a lot of behind the scenes and publicity shots you won’t have seen before.
Thans for the instagram link but can’t view unless you have an account!
Too bad. It is possible to make a private account if that appeals. If not that’s ok too.
What talent! The trailer was a delight!
I loved it. I’m going to be going through a bunch of Preston Sturges films soon but at the tail end of the Classic Screwball Comedy collection on the Criterion channel are three or four screwball comedies that I have not yet seen. The channel seems to feature one or more collections of Hollywood fare a month which I think they get from TCM. The November noir one was fantastic. These films are not permanent features of the channel which still mainly carries Criterion releases.
What a brilliant way to refresh the channel!