Siebenmal lockt das Weib

A film directed by the great Vittorio de Sica with Shirley MacLaine! How exciting I thought. Then, every episode has Shirley with a different leading man, Peter Sellers, Alan Arkin, Michael Caine, Vittorio Gassman, Rossano Brazzi, etc, etc. Well, it was too good to be true. The stories are slight and I kept waiting for a bit of ooph. Okay, no. No oomph really but it has moments. Michael Caine and Shirley in a moving comedy of errors for instance and it has her, Shirley MacLaine and that in itself makes it a must because she'll be there for us , seven times, one hundred per cent.

Shirley plays the lead in seven different stories in Paris in different love situations. The best one is the sixth, a marvellous travesty of Marcel Carné's "Le jour se lève" with Jean Gabin and Arletty, and almost identically in the same squalid hotel, where Shirley and Alan Arkin intend to do themselves in, but there are arguments about it. This is great fun and Cesare Zavattini and Vittorio de Sica at their best. The other episodes are rather uneven, but the second one, where Shirley comes home to find her husband (Rossano Brazzi) in bed with another woman, whereupon she runs out in the streets in a panic and happen to a bunch of prostitutes in the park, who decide to help her, while her husband comes running out in the streets after her in his pyjamas, is also well written. The tendency of the others is that you will eventually get a bit tired of finding only Shirley MacLaine in all of them - there is a little of Anita Ekberg in the last of them, but not much. All other characters are subordinate. It is entertaining on the whole, but you don't laugh much, while instead you find some situations rather awkward and painful, like the luxurious opera spectacle with Patrick Wymark in a typical role of his. Peter Sellers is excellent in the very first episode, which is the briefest. In brief, this is not one of de Sica-Zavattini's best works, but it has some excellent highlights.

Shirley MacLaine's performance, interpreting 7 women as different as it can be, is quite breathtaking. The quality of the mini-stories is uneven, some have aged rather badly in my opinion: Funeral Possession, Super Simone and Suicides. Others still provide a real entertainment and great fun: At the opera, Amateur night, and especially the last one, Snow, also starring Michael Caine, with a quite magical and fairy atmosphere. This was clearly the best part! With so many great talents on screen, I expected a little more from Vittorio de Sica, a director I appreciate very much. Besides MacLaine and Caine, we find indeed a rather exceptional cast with Peter Sellers, Elsa Martinelli, Vittorio Gasman, Anita Ekberg, Philippe Noiret. Unfortunately, the format of 7 vignettes and the rather thin scenarios do not allow these great talents to express themselves as they should. The movie would have been much better with 3 or 4 mini-stories, not more. De Sica took an evident pleasure in lining up the stars like pearls on a necklace, and Shirley MacLaine obviously enjoyed herself in this collection of roles, dresses and wigs. But the end result is still a bit meager. This film was for me like an appetizer buffet, pretty to watch, sometimes fun to taste, but in the end you still fell hungry about something more substantial...

Shirley MacLaine playing seven different women in seven short stories directed by Vittorio De Sica about male-female relationships. Putting indefatigable Shirley in a variety of wigs and costumes opposite a host of male and female stars in guest cameos probably sounded foolproof, but the movie progressively loses steam after its opening episode at a funeral (and the whole idea reminds one of MacLaine's "What a Way to Go!" besides). Alan Arkin, Rossano Brazzi, Shirley's "Gambit" co-star Michael Caine, Elsa Martinelli, Anita Ekberg, Vittorio Gassman and a pre-"Being There" Peter Sellers offer some cute bits and pieces, but this isn't the comedic tour-de-force MacLaine's fans were hoping for. US-French-Italian co-production doesn't look terribly good, while director De Sica's work is scattershot. ** from ****

There are two types of movies that came out of the 1960s: strange, experimental films and lusciously colored films that made later generations ask, "Were the sixties really like that?" Woman Times Seven is a mixture of both, which would be a reason to watch it, if you're interested in different types of classic films. The movie has beautiful costumes, lavish colors, and oddly 60s music; and at the same time, it's strange and experimental. Seven completely unrelated short stories—each about infidelity—are played out, all starring Shirley MacLaine! She really is darling, so if you want to see her in various wigs and furs, and with beautiful expressions from heavily made up eyes, you won't want to miss this one.

The vignettes themselves aren't really all that good. Shirley has several different costars, including Peter Sellars, Alan Arkin, Rossano Brazzi, and Michael Caine. But the plots vary from silly to stalker-y to sad. It's not the best movie out there, but it won't hurt you if you want to see pretty people up on the screen.