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RobertAltman wrote: a Leonard Maltin appreciation (I wonder if he was wearing a Lubitsch pin when he wrote it)

I'm glad someone else has noticed and mocked Maltin's pin obsession. I've spun tales of A Day in the Life of Leonard Maltin that mostly focuses on him selecting pins between the normal tasks of his life. Those tasks being eye brow raising exercises, standing in front of a house and discussing the Disney company, and apologizing for the humor of the 1930s and 1940s.

Anyway, I do think Trouble in Paradise is incredible and few films can stand next to it for its incredible sophistication and coy sensuality. However, there are other Lubitsch movies that can not reach Trouble's cinematic majesty. For some members that includes Heaven Can Wait. Just a warning...

I have a hunch that if you were blown away by Trouble in Paradise, that you'll surely love Heaven Can Wait. Though keep in my there is only one devirginizing experience in terms of Lubitsch virgins.

Cold Bishop wrote:

vivahawks wrote:It's a classic because it works completely as a romantic comedy while simultaneously probing the assumptions and implications of the form. That's why at first glance and in bits and pieces it seems so "normal": it neatly follows all the rules of the game, the meet-cute, the misunderstandings, etc, but then it taps into the real emotions behind these cliches and compares them with the cookie-cutter responses the characters and audience expect. And it does turn out to be a dangerous film and a dreadful one in the true sense, because what's worse than to find out that all your pretensions and lofty ideas about love, life, destiny, etc are trite and derivative? And like many of the greatest Hollywood films Shop wraps this dark and complex level up in the most charming and entertaining packaging possible, so you can choose for yourself whether to examine it closely or not.

So you're saying the movie gets more interesting?

What makes Shop Around the Corner work for me most of all is that it's one of the few comedies that really is about the workplace experience -- not a fantasy version of it, or a sentimental "working people" version, or the workplace nightmare from Billy Wilder's The Apartment (or for that matter the Lubitsch If I Had a Million sketch that influenced the look of Apartment), but just the everyday reality of people who need to work and can't afford to lose their jobs.

Lubitsch and Raphaelson filled Shop with these moments that really ring true, such as the uncomfortable situation of having your boss ask you for his opinion on his stupid idea (and the varying reactions of the employees: Jimmy Stewart tells him straight out that it's a bad idea, Ilona tries to find something noncommittal to say, Joseph Schildkraut sucks up and Felix Bressart's character just runs away and hides), or trying to get away from work a little early so you can go on a date, or dealing with the boss when he's in a bad mood, or the "routine" retail workers have to go through with their customers. The romantic comedy has extra depth because it takes place in this real atmosphere of the working life, between two people who have real-world work problems on their minds and often argue over work issues. Most romantic comedies, including Lubitsch's, are about people who either don't have to work or for whom work is a secondary concern. Here it's at the heart of everything.

And so many key moments in the film have extra resonance because of that real atmosphere of workplace politics, like when Felix Bressart, a character who is deathly afraid of losing his job and constantly worries about making ends meet for his family (including paying for medical care) admonishes Frank Morgan for firing Jimmy Stewart: the moment could be small, but instead it's a big moment because we know how fearful this man is of saying anything that might cost him his job.

I'd compare it, in a weird way, to The Office (both versions). Whether that means that John Krasinski is the new Jimmy Stewart is another matter entirely.

I am always surprised by how few people (even here, perhaps) seem to have bothered to check out the quite fine Image DVD of "Marriage Circle".

Agreed. Excellent version curated by David Shepard. Incidentally, exactly the same version is out in Germany and France from arte edition, with some nice extras including a very sensible discussion of the film by Eisenschitz. Certainly one of Lubitsch's best.

Michael Kerpan wrote:I am always surprised by how few people (even here, perhaps) seem to have bothered to check out the quite fine Image DVD of "Marriage Circle".

It's not listed at DVD Planet, unless I'm searching for it incorrectly. Is it still in print?

Answering my own question - it's listed at Amazon. I wonder why not at DVD Planet.

Glenn Kenny has a brief appraisal of the set up at his blog, including some screenshots that have completely made my day.

When you're reading something called "Miriam Hopkins In Her Underwear," you know it's going to be good

also, this comment made me lol:

Claire K wrote:Or, "Uncle Ernie's Pre Code Panty Parties."

davidhare wrote:These movies are definitely more apropos if you're a big fan of Jeanette in negligees, as a dear (het) friend of mine is. To me she's totally glacial.

I have ordered these despite myself - I already had them all from the old laserdisc box - but they are far from my favorite Lubes. By far the best of these musicals is the currently unavailable Merry Widow from MGM.

Keyword... Lubes.

For anyone else revving their engines for this set, the still-unavailable The Merry Widow is on YouTube in its entirety.

Here's a little ditty to get you all warmed up...

Just a note about The Smiling Lieutenant: on the laserdisc version, one shot was missing (as I recall): an insert of a newspaper headline saying "ROYALTY INSULTED! LIEUTENANT LAUGHS AT PRINCESS!" That shot is intact in the new set.

Also, the liner notes don't mention much about the operetta the film is based on, A Waltz Dream, so for the curious, here are some musical excerpts from Oscar Straus's original operetta, accompanying a clip from Lubitsch's The Marriage Circle. Most of these tunes, along with many others from A Waltz Dream, are used as background music in The Smiling Lieutenant.

As he and Raphaelson usually did when adapting stage works, Lubitsch and Raphaelson didn't keep much from A Waltz Dream and started the story long before the play begins -- the play starts with Niki's wedding -- but the basic plot is the same as is the resolution (though in the original it's more about Franzi teaching the princess to act Viennese, this being the ideal of all womanhood).

Those interested in this topic should read Ben Brewster's article "The Circle: Lubitsch and the Theatrical Farce Tradition" in Film History vol. 13 (2001), pp. 372–89. PM me if you'd like a copy.

What a great set! Having gone through most of it this weekend, the image quality was satisfactory and the films themselves were a real treat for my wife, whose favorite film--Love Me Tonight--has left her with a permanent Chevalier fix.

The timing on this release was also genius, and hopefully Criterion makes some money on the Valentine's business... I know my set was intended as a gift opened early. (This in spite of the long standing "no DVDs for V-Day" rule!)

Critic's Choice: New DVDs by Dave Kehr

Film history books recount how the four musicals directed by Ernst Lubitsch in the early years of sound — “The Love Parade” (1929), “Monte Carlo” (1930), “The Smiling Lieutenant” (1931) and “One Hour With You” (1932) — helped define what talking movies would be. Now all four have been released in “Lubitsch Musicals,” an indispensable boxed set from Eclipse.

davidhare wrote:As for these movies defining what the sound era would be, what about Sternberg (Morocco) or Lang (Testament of Dr Mabuse) fer chrissake.

He said what they would be, not what they should be. Lubitsch's combination of stagy Broadway-style plots and dialogue with some additional "cinematic" flourishes probably did have a lot of influence on early talkies, especially because Love Parade was really considered a breakthrough at the time. (Samson Raphaelson thought it was the first talkie that really impressed him, even before he met Lubitsch.)

My problem - which others obviously don't share - is the quality of the material Lubitsch uses - pure Hungarian poshlosht.

I think to like Love Parade -- and I really enjoy it -- you kind of have to have a tolerance for the kind of jokes you get in Broadway shows of the time, the slightly corny, cute humor that was all over Broadway and got imported to early talkies. Guy Bolton, the most prolific Broadway musical librettist of the time, co-wrote Love Parade, hence the corny turns of phrase ("You call that a goose step? That isn't a chicken step!"). I love that kind of thing but it's undeniable that the level of joke writing improved a lot when Lubitsch brought in Raphaelson for Smiling Lieutenant.

One advantage that Love Parade has, though, is that it's the only one of Lubitsch's musicals that actually gives musical performers (Chevalier, MacDonald, Lupino Lane) a chance to do their stuff at any length. Unlike Mamoulian in Love Me Tonight, Lubitsch kept reducing the importance of songs until by the time of Merry Widow, there's only one really big number and no songs in the last half-hour of the picture.

Speaking of Mamoulian, and foreshadowing the greatness of what talkies could achieve, Lube (within the musical/semimusical form on display here) never came near Applause, Mamoulians film debut from 1929-- nowhere within a split end dangling off the genitals of a flea--... a film which showed the greatness that sound film could achieve, but rarely has since and to this day.

One movie in and I'm already over the moon. I wasn't prepared for the Love Parade to be anywhere near as funny as it was based on the lukewarm praise I've been reading for the set. Loved the sort of quasi-Apache Dance between the servant and the maid too!

Ever see the manic dance party routine in The Oyster Princess? That's true pre-Python.

Monte Carlo suffers a bit from Buchanan being no Chevalier, but there's still some great songs ("Trimmin' Women" was particularly catchy), a good stream of laughs (though it never reaches the heights from the Love Parade) and that fantastic operahouse finale.

davidhare wrote:Further to Domino's post about Buchanan (a truly colorless performer in Monte Carlo!) and my favorite scene in that movie - the park bench scene between Buchanan and the hairdresser when Jack conspires the ruse to get to Jeanette's boudoir. Maybe it's only me but the way Lube plays off the gay innuendo here (as he does in a party scene between Horton and Marshall in Trouble in Paradise) is breathtakingly risque. But maybe I'm the only one reading the scenes this way!

I tend to lean away from most homoerotic readings but I agree, as I thought the same thing while watching and I think it's about as blatantly executed as Lubitsch thought he could get away with.

domino harvey wrote:

davidhare wrote:Further to Domino's post about Buchanan (a truly colorless performer in Monte Carlo!) and my favorite scene in that movie - the park bench scene between Buchanan and the hairdresser when Jack conspires the ruse to get to Jeanette's boudoir. Maybe it's only me but the way Lube plays off the gay innuendo here (as he does in a party scene between Horton and Marshall in Trouble in Paradise) is breathtakingly risque. But maybe I'm the only one reading the scenes this way!

I tend to lean away from most homoerotic readings but I agree, as I thought the same thing while watching and I think it's about as blatantly executed as Lubitsch thought he could get away with.

I'll third davidhare and domino -- you don't have to be on the lookout for homoerotic undercurrents to find them here -- although I'd go farther than domino on one point: Buchanan's performance in Monte Carlo is a disaster. Poor Jeanette MacDonald; the only contemporary analog I can imagine would be a love-triangle comedy in which someone like Zooey Deschanel or Kirsten Dunst was torn between her two suitors, Nathan Lane and Harvey Fierstein. Still, the movie is pretty charming -- it's Lubitsch, after all -- and you're right -- "Trimmin' Women" is hilarious.

PS: The most influential and important of all film critics -- I refer to myself, of course -- has weighed in on the set here.

This must be the first Criterion release that specifies aspect ratios not corresponding to any "standard" ones (1.33, 1.19, 1.85, etc.).

The Love Parade is listed as 1.21
Monte Carlo as 1.20
The Smiling Lieutenant 1.21
One Hour With You 1.36

I always thought "1.33" was shorthand for what was essentially 1.37, but now they put 1.36?! What's with the specificity here?

One small complaint: I wanted to go straight to "Trimmin' Women" and noticed that the chapter stops aren't at every song like most musical DVDs-- lame!