135. The Philadelphia Story (1940)

Directed By George Cukor

Synopsis

Seems quite familiar by now, divorce Cary Grant wants to prevent his ex-wife form getting married a second time. Well, it is slightly more complicated than that, he takes a couple of reporters to the wedding, one of which (Jimmy Stewart) has a drunken party night with the bride Tracy Lord (Katherine Hepburn). Wedding is called off and Cary Grant marries his ex-wife... it is a good film tough.

Review

Ok, just by looking at the DVD cover you know that you are in for a treat, Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart and Katherine Hepburn in the same film... wowzers. Snd then the film surprises you but doesn't disappoint. We have seen Hepburn and Grant before in some pretty crazy, laugh a minute screwball comedies, you would expect something of the kind here.

Well if you did expect that you wouldn't be completely wrong, there are plenty of witticisms and laughs here, but they are always more smirks than laughs. The film is actually a very intelligently written work, it is not so much played for laughs, but something actually a bit deeper than that.

There are many discussions about class ans stations in society here, and most of them make some quite good points, also it is quite a risqué film for 1940, Hepburn sends her marriage to hell for a drunken night with a guy she had only just met and is never punished by it, in fact she saves herself from a doomed marriage. The acting is all quite superb, you really relate to all those characters, and in the end it is what comedies aren't that much anymore, funny but with a big brain and a heart in the right place without false morals. Great. Get it from Amazon UK or US.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The play was Hepburn's first great triumph after several movie flops (including the classic Bringing Up Baby), which had led to her being labeled "box office poison". Howard Hughes bought the rights to the film as a gift to Hepburn. When Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer decided to make a movie out of it, she stipulated in her contract that the film could not be made unless she was allowed to reprise her stage role. Hepburn initially wanted Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy for the male leads but they were not available.

It was remade in 1956 as a musical titled High Society, starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, and Frank Sinatra.

The Three Greats together: