Irma la Douce (1963) - Wilder's overlong prostitution comedy

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Colorful levity and hijinks are promised on this poster for Billy Wilder's Irma la Douce

In Paris' sinful Rue Casanova, a new copper roams, indignant and active in upsetting the obvious prostitution going on there, but only until he falls head over heels for the charming Irma.

 

Irma la Douce is written by I.A.L. Diamond (One, Two, Three (1961)) and Austrian-Hungarian/American master filmmaker, co-writer/co-producer/director Billy Wilder (Bad Seed (1934)), whose 19th feature it was. It is an adaptation of the same-titled 1956 French stage musical. The title is French and translates to 'Irma the sweet'.

This poorly aged Wilder adaptation beckons you to accept prostitution a an easy and comfortable life, one that is also natural and without any negative sides to it. That proposition is a hard one to swallow, and fatiguing as well. The same can be said of Jack Lemmon's (Some Like It Hot (1959)) policeman character's unexplained 180 turn in the story from a by-the-book stickler to a completely embracing participant in the monkey business goings on of the Rue Casanova. His plan involves him keeping Shirley MacLaine's (Around the World in 80 Days (1956)) Irma from her sidewalk 'career' by dressing up as an English professor with very deep pockets.

Jokes are repeated ad infinitum. Irma la Douce is overlong. Handsome sets and costumes weigh up; and Lemmon's caricature of an Englishman is funny. But Irma la Douce overall is taxing.

 

Related posts:

Billy Wilder:  The Front Page (1974) - Wilder's hilarious Chicago newspaper comedy

Double Indemnity (1944) - Wilder's noir classic 

 

 

Watch a trailer for the movie here

 

Cost: 5 mil. $

Box office: 31.5 mil. $

= Huge hit (returned 6.3 times its cost)

[Irma la Douce premiered 5 June (New York) and runs 147 minutes. The film was envisioned as a repairing of Lemmon with Wilder and Marilyn Monroe as Irma, but the latter's overdose death in 1962 meant the hiring of MacLaine. It seems that Wilder, Lemmon and MacLaine negotiated the same pay deal of 350k $ plus 7.5 % of the profits, a very lucrative deal as it turned out, which reportedly also meant that United Artists only profited 440k $ from the film's stellar theatrical run. Shooting took place from October 1962 - February 1963 in California and Paris, France. The film was a huge hit in North America, where it was the year's 5th highest-grossing with rentals of 12 mil. $/25.2 mil. $ (80 % of the total gross). It also struck huge in Netherlands with 3.6 mil. admissions, becoming the biggest hit in the country for many years. The film was nominated for 3 Oscars, winning for Best Score - Adaptation/Treatment (André Previn (Dead Ringer (1963))). It lost Best Actress (MacLaine) to Patricia Neal in Hud and Cinematography - Color (Joseph LaShelle (A Child Is Waiting (1963))) to Leon Shamroy for Cleopatra. It was also nominated for a BAFTA, won a David di Donatello award and 1/3 Golden Globe nominations, among other honors. Wilder returned with Kiss Me, Stupid (1964). Lemmon returned in Under the Yum Yum Tree (1963); MacLaine in What a Way to Go! (1964). Irma la Douce is fresh at 75 % at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Irma la Douce? 

Fading Gigolo (2013) - Turturro's pleasant turn as a high-end NY prostitute

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The humorous, lush poster for John Turturro's Fading Gigolo

QUICK REVIEW:

In an economical fix, the aging guy Mo gets an idea for how he and his good, younger pal can make some easy bucks: He is going to rent him out as a prostitute.

Fading Gigolo is a cozy time and an enjoyable film that contains some fine reflections on sex and attraction as well as some very photogenic actresses. The Jewish element of the story became a bit heavy at some point for me, a gentile, and it is possible to zone out at times, but over-all, Fading Gigolo is a fine little film.
Woody Allen, writer-director-star John Turturro's (Barton Fink (1991)) co-star in the film, heard about the project at his barber, whom he shares with Turturro.
This is not Turturro's first film as a filmmaker: Actually he debuted way back in 1992 with the drama Mac, which he co-wrote, directed and played the lead in.

Related review:

John Turturro: Barton Fink (1991) or, The Writer's Hell (actor)
 

Sharon Stone is one of the sexy women in John Turturro's Fading Gigolo

This poster presents the film as if it was a Woody Allen movie

And this one more as a sensual, erotic film

Watch the trailer here

Cost: 30 mil. $
Box office: 13.3 mil. $
= Huge flop
[Fading Gigolo might have suffered some from its confused marketing (see posters above) and mixed reviews, but its main problem clearly is that it was made way too expensively: It isn't surprising that a sex comedy by Turturro, not a director-name that draws crowds, with heavy Jewish plot-points, doesn't make more than 13.3 mil. $ But, on the other hand, it is a wonder that someone produced that film for 30 and not 5 or 10 mil. $.]

What do you think of Fading Gigolo?
If you have seen other films directed by John Turturro, how were they?

Nights of Cabiria/Le Notti di Cabiria (1957) - Fellini serves private infatuation as incredible masterpiece

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Giulietta Masina sends us a look on the poster for Federico Fellini's Nights of Cabiria

Cabiria is the Cannes' Grand Prix- and Best Foreign Film Oscar-winning film by Italian master director Federico Fellini (8½ (1963)). In it, we follow the street girl Cabiria, a prostitute, as she is betrayed by her boyfriend in the very beginning of the film: 'Her' Giorgio steals her purse and pushes her into the river. She gets saved and later continues her destitute life in search of other men that might save her, SPOILER visiting a church, other prostitutes, a vaudeville club, going home with a movie star, joining a magic act and finally, she thinks, finding the man she will marry.
Cabiria moves forward like a river; things happen, but there's never any sense of suspense, so that our entire involvement rests on our ability to identify with Cabiria.
She is played by Giulietta Masina (La Strada (1954)), and she is a mercurial, loud-mouthed, gullible soul. Masina has a magic to her way and that smile she gives to convince someone else of a human bond between her and him, even if he's a cop on the nightly streets of Rome trying to get her to conduct her business elsewhere. She's wonderful in La Strada, which is a masterpiece that hits so many more keys. Here I couldn't get past the distraction that co-writer/director Fellini cast her in the lead again, - Masina was Fellini's wife for 50 years (1943-93), until they both died shortly after one another, - and he seems to have created the whole film around his infatuation with her, which would have to carry on to the audiences for it to work, - which clearly it did, just not for me.
I think the story is pretty thin, and maybe there's too much Italian shouting going on for me to get very emotionally involved in the film. Also some of the Fellini-elements, (the magic act, the African dance act), seem forced into the film just for it to have some content. It didn't get magical for me in Cabiria; I didn't feel transported to another place as I did in La Strada, - instead it got dull, and I almost dozed off a few times.

The details:

Still, Cabiria is worth seeing for Masina's charismatic performance and some fine moments and light amusement. The film also has what is termed 'neorealistic elements' understood mostly as poor Romans of the time, as Italy was still financially drained after WWII; we see a woman that lives in a cave and witness poverty in other ways. Contradictorily, which annoyed me, we never really learn how Cabiria affords her house, or, more mysteriously, how she is able to gather so much money for her marriage dowry at the end of the film.
She is then, once again, SPOILER betrayed and ripped off by a scoundrel posing as a gentleman, and Cabiria is in tatters, having now lost everything, we assume. She goes crying to the streets, and the film ends with Masina's legendary move from despairing tears to an optimistic smile and even to look at us, the audience, as she walks the noisy, happy streets of Rome. A wonderful end to a film that is whimsical and rackety, a meager dalliance.
Cabiria was produced by legendary Italian producer Dino de Laurentiis, who showed his infamous daring here in producing a film about a prostitute heroine, something no-one else wanted to at the time. Fellini made it after The Swindle/The Swindlers/Il Bidone (1955) a mostly forgotten swindler drama between La Strada and the acclaimed Cabiria. Fellini was in the process of changing styles quite dramatically at this time, just as Italy was changing, as his next picture became the acclaimed, long comedy-drama La Dolce Vita (1960)

Related review:

Federico Fellini:  8½ (1963) or, Vive la Cinema!

One of the striking images in Federico Fellini's Nights of Cabiria

A short trailer for the restored version of the film

Budget: Unknown
Box office: 0.7 mil. $ (US 1998 reissue only)
= Unknown

What do you think of Nights of Cabiria?
And of Fellini's other films?