Film Review
Of all the great filmmakers working in Hollywood in the 1960s, surely
none was better suited to making a bubbly French farce than Billy
Wilder, whose previous sex comedies
The Seven Year Itch (1955) and
Some Like It Hot (1959) had enjoyed
great success on both sides of the Atlantic.
Irma la Douce started out as a
hugely popular French musical play by Alexandre Breffort and Marguerite
Monnot, which ran for seven hundred performances in Paris. Wilder
removed the songs, André Previn rewrote the score, but the film
still manages to capture the essence of that mythical City of Lights
where romance is etched on every paving stone.
Irma la Douce may not be
Wilder's best film (it is clearly too long and flabby, its humour
relying far too heavily on tacky double entendre) but it still has
great entertainment value and manages to evoke some of the poetry of
earlier great French films by René Clair and Marcel
Carné. The film's unmistakable Gallic feel is largely down
to its set designer Alexandre Trauner, who had cut his professional teeth
working on some of the greatest French films, such as
Hôtel
du Nord (1938) and
Les Enfants du paradis (1945).
The film features a memorable rematch of Jack Lemmon and Shirley
MacLaine, who had previously appeared together in Billy Wilder's
The Apartment (1960).
MacLaine was in fact a last minute replacement for Marilyn Monroe, who
died tragically shortly before the film went into production.
Jack Lemmon was a favourite of Billy Wilder and starred in seven of his
films, most famously in
Some Like it
Hot. Much of the appeal of
Irma La Douce is down to the
sizzling on-screen rapport between Lemmon and MacLaine. The
latter may catch our eye with her famous emerald green stockings but it
is Lemmon who shines brightest, particularly with his hilarious
portrayal of an England lord, which owes a great deal to Terry-Thomas.
© James Travers 2008
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Next Billy Wilder film:
Kiss Me, Stupid (1964)
Film Synopsis
The rue Casanova offers rich pickings for Parisian prostitutes,
especially Irma la Douce, who never fails to extort a little extra from
her clients. Most of the local gendarmes turn a blind eye
to what goes on, in return for a small bribe, but the impeccably honest
Nestor Patou takes a different line. Unfortunately, his attempt
to clean up the district merely loses him his job. Penniless, he
accepts Irma's offer of a place in her cramped rented room and work as
her business manager, and it isn't long before he finds he is in
love. Unable to accept that Irma should earn her living by
prostitution, Nestor disguises himself as a rich English lord and gives
her five hundred francs, loaned to him by the friendly owner of a bar,
every time they play solitaire together. Nestor quickly realises
the flaw in his scheme, and to earn the money to pay Irma he has to get
a job in Les Halles market. Of course, Nestor's mysterious
absences and constant fatigue merely make Irma suspicious that he is
seeing other women, and in the end she decides to run away to England
with her rich lord. At this point, things get very
complicated...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.