Köchin gesucht

Okay, before I begin, I should point out that cynical people are warned NOT to watch this little fantasy film. However, everyone else should delight in watching this very simple yet very enjoyable film. Sure, there are a few story elements that just don't make sense--but my advice is to try to ignore these and keep watching--the payoff makes it well worth your time.

A young couple, John Lund and Gene Tierney, are getting married but are unaware that Lund's mother (Thelma Ritter) is broke and has no place to live. However, Ritter is very proud and won't admit this or that she doesn't have the money to look nice for the wedding, so she skips the service on a pretense. Later, and here's where realism goes out the window, she shows up at Lund's and Tierney's apartment and Tierney thinks Ritter is the maid who has come to help her cook for a big party! Ritter does NOT tell her who she really is and makes a terrific spread. Only later does Lund come in the kitchen and sees what's occurred! Now even then, you MUST suspend disbelief because Lund doesn't tell his wife the truth--he was interrupted as he was telling her later that night, as she was trying to make passionate love to him and he just forgot! As a guy, I actually can believe this--at least short-term, but not for most of the movie! BEAR WITH IT!!! Ritter, one of the best forgotten supporting players (here in a starring role), is utterly charming as the housekeeper and she is able to do wonders to help the young but troubled marriage. How it all works out so perfectly in the end makes it all worth while (particular with as it involves Lund's boss, played by Larry Keating). A charming film that is practically impossible not to like!! They don't make sweet and charming films like this any more.

Mitchell Leisen directed three wonderful movies, one very good one, may fine ones, and some that weren't successful. No matter what one thinks of the hauteur theory, he was a fine stylist and that's not a bad track record.

The three beauties include this one. Also there are "Midnight," one of the most glamorous and charming of all screwball comedies, and "Easy Living." That may have been Jean Arthur at her very best (and most lovable.) (The very good one, in my view, is "Death Takes A Holiday.") Thelma Ritter carries this one. So, as she might say with a flip of a dust rag, "what else is new?" Indeed, she is one of the treasures of American movie history.

Here she is the mother of John Lund, who is not very appealing. She's as blue collar as blue collar can be. Lund has fallen for and married Gene Tierney. Her mother is played very stylishly by Miriam Hopkins. Well, which one would you want as a mother? Or a mother-in-law? Thing is, Thelma is mistaken for a maid when she arrives the day of Lund and Tierney's wedding and carries on this charade for most of the movie. It's sad, really. That part is rarely played for laughs and it is indeed far more poignant than funny.

Larry Keating is good as Lund's ultimate boss. The actor playing his son is a cipher and looks almost Keating's age.

But this is Ritter's movie. Does she steal scenes? Not discernibly, though I've heard her accused of doing that in other films. She steals the picture. And our hearts.

In debt to the Jersey City bank, hard-working widow Thelma Ritter (as Ellen) gives up her hamburger stand and hitchhikes by pick-up truck and school bus to visit earnest son John Lund (as Val McNulty) in Meridian, Ohio. Meanwhile, Mr. Lund has rescued beautiful socialite Gene Tierney (as Maggie Carleton) from a bad date with the boss' son. Lund and Ms. Tierney immediately get the urge to mate. When Ms. Ritter meets her new daughter-in-law, Tierney mistakes her for the cook...

Down on her luck, Ritter agrees to work incognito as maid in her son's apartment. The funny situation gets funnier when Tierney's uppity mother Miriam Hopkins (as Fran) arrives for an extended visit. Producer Charles Brackett and director Mitchell Leisen wisely keep the focus on Ritter, who turned her inappropriate fourth-billing into "Best Supporting Actress" nominations from the "Film Daily", "Golden Globes" and "Academy Awards" groups. In this one, Ritter is the star.

******** The Mating Season (1/12/51) Mitchell Leisen ~ Thelma Ritter, John Lund, Gene Tierney, Miriam Hopkins

Though Gene Tierney and John Lund are the leads in this film, Thelma Ritter steals it completely as Lund's down to earth plebian mother from New Jersey. Thelma got one of her Oscar nominations for Best Supporting Actress, the second of six she was to earn in her career.

Mitchell Leisen directs this charming comedy about a pair of sudden newlyweds, she a débutante and him a working stiff reporter. They meet when Lund saves Tierney's life as she goes off the road and drives precariously on to a cliff's edge. Both abandon their respective prospective mates, Lund says goodbye to Jan Sterling and she to James Lorimer who also happens to be the son of Lund's boss Larry Keating.

Tierney's one nervous new bride wanting to make sure her first dinner party goes right and when Ritter comes knocking at her door, Tierney mistakes her for the new maid she wanted. God knows Thelma Ritter played enough maids in her career, it was an honest mistake. Then of course Lund can't quite break it to her, even after grand dame Miriam Hopkins as Tierney's mother arrives on the scene.

It all sounds real silly, but it actually does work, Leisen's direction and the talent of his cast actually carry this off.

Thelma Ritter went six times to the Oscars as a nominee for Best Supporting Actress and she could have won in any of those years. This year of 1951 her nomination and everything else that year had to face up against A Streetcar Named Desire and she lost to Kim Hunter as Stella Kowalski.

Maybe she should have been up for Best Actress though I doubt Thelma Ritter would have won against Vivien Leigh. Still she's the main reason to see The Mating Season.

This is a lost treasure, I saw it a few nights ago on TCM, and was surprise about the acting and the quality of the movie, script and direction, and for a change it is not set in New York or Los Angeles, but in Cleveland, Ohio. Gene Tierney was fantastic in this movie. I wondered aloud why Paramount Pictures have not release this movie on DVD. Gene Tierney is by far one of the most beautiful women ever in movie history. This is a newer version of screwball comedies, but with a twist, I won't spoil it for you. Here goes what I can tell you, two mother-in-laws, a newly wed couple, a rich spoil kid and a beautiful woman, got it? That is all I will say, this movie is a charm. Even if you don't like screwball comedies, Gene Tierney is worth the time, she is just great to look at, a very beautiful woman.