El hombre que se perdió a sí mismo

The beginning of The Man Who Lost Himself is hilarious: Brian Aherne meets his lookalike in a bar and the two Brians share a drink. One of the Brians has just been double-crossed by his work partner, and the other has just escaped from a mental asylum. The next morning, one of the Brians wakes up in a mansion, waited on hand and foot by a valet, S.Z. Sakall, being called the other Brian's name. The morning papers reveal the other Brian (the millionaire) was killed the night before, jumping in front of a subway train, pretending to the pauper. If the real pauper (the one who woke up in the mansion) reveals the mix-up, he'll be accused of murder. But if he stays put, he'll have to impersonate the other Brian with his wife, Kay Francis, his girlfriend, Dorothy Tree, and his friends.

Are you confused yet? Good, because I was enormously confused. The opening scene with Brian playing a drinking game with himself is very funny, but as soon as they swapped, I remained confused until the end. I never did figure out all the twists and turns, but since this is a silly comedy, I suppose it doesn't really matter. I loved Cuddles Sakall, who provided adorable quips every time he opened his mouth. If you liked the madcap Merrily We Live, you'll probably like to see Brian using his comic talents again in this one. And who wouldn't want two Brian Ahernes to look at?

Just sometime back saw another - and this one is almost a remake of that (though the story credit-wise these are different). All these are different variants of Prisoner of Zenda etc - where a Hero replaces his look-alike dissolute and gets the fiancee/ wife fall in love with him.

It was The Masquerader (1933) as most of the reviewers are equating it to Dave - the Dave is very highly influenced by - not this but the Masquerader - there too the delinquent person was an ex-great Political leader. Comparing the casts, naturally Ahrne and Colman, both are great, and fitted the role almost perfectly, may be Colman got a slight edge. But on female lead, the estranged wife Kay balanced the edge against Elissa Landi.

But there the comparion ends - Sakall as teh confidante doesn't come anywhere in portraying what Hobbes did in masquerader.

And compared to that story - or should I say execution ? Well, this was atrocious. TM's basic advantage was the believable meeting as well as twin-image - the good man was first cousin of the bad-politician, estranged for long (the aunt, probably after an undesirable marriage, not clarified, had skipped the country). Hobebs however could guess it soon, and that was one of the reason for him to encourage the masquerade, and also keep the, now again in love, wife away from the husband. here somehow it looked too concocted act. Only saving grace, for me, were the two leads, both of whom are in my 'like' group. But after all, they can't give too much of a push, can they ?

This 1941 Universal comedy pairs two attractive stars in a not-so-screwball comedy that tries hard but has some problems. Aherne plays two look-alike men who switch places after drinking in a bar. When he wakes up the next morning he finds he mistaken for a millionaire married to Kay Francis. As he tries to convince people he's not the rich guy, he discovers the millionaire was just out of a nut house and had a shady history of embezzlement, adultery, and forgery. But the more he insists he's not the millionaire, the more everyone is convinced he's still nutty.

So-so but complete copy includes scenes listed as missing in other reviews, but probably don't really help much. The plot is just too far-fetched ends up repeating itself. Aherne and Francis are good together but the script and director (and maybe the editor) deflate the soufflé.

Co-stars include S.Z. Sakall, Nils Asther, Henry Stephenson, Dorothy Tree, Janet Beecher, Henry Kolker, Sarah Padden, Sig Ruman, and Marc Lawrence as a gangster named DeSoto. Billy Benedict has a nice bit as the messenger boy in the elevator. Silent star Charles Ray is supposedly in the cast in an unnamed part.

The idea is brilliant and perfect as a starter for a brilliant intrigue, whether for a thriller or a screwball comedy. It looks as if both are getting triggered. Brian Aherne comes back to New York a ruined man after a stranded business deal from Puerto Rico, and his business partner down there tells him to swim back home to Puerto Rico. Brian Aherne gets infuriated by his frustration and takes an awful lot of drinks, telling everybody he meets to repeat after him that his colleague Mr. Phillips is a skunk. One of the other guests he meets at the bar happens to look exactly like him, they could be mistaken for each other's doubles, that other man also has something to drown in drinks, so they go celebrating together. That other man never comes back. Brian Aherne is taken for him and brought home to a luxury apartment where he has every difficulty in the world to convince everybody that he is not the right man, and the more he insists, the less he is believed. Then the comedy bolts off tying itself up in knots of inextricable complications, and two women are involved, his wife and his mistress, who only wants to extort her "booby-wooby" for money. Kay Francis is the wife, always excellent, and she eventually finds out that she is a widow, since the real man was lost in an accident at night. In spite of all the complications and muddled up intrigues, something seems to come out right in the end, while the one who really has a hard job to get through is the wonderful old Hungarian butler S. Z. Sakall, crowning the comedy with his constant worries.

John Evans (Brian Aherne) is shocked to meet his exact double, the rich man Malcolm Scott (also Aherne). However, after Scott is killed, everyone thinks Evans is this rich jerk...including Scott's wife (Kay Francis). However, John likes the wife and after a while realizes it might not be so bad to BE Malcolm. But can he manage to right the screwed up life that Malcolm left him? And, just how much of a jerk was Malcolm and what sort of dirty work was he doing??

If this sounds a lot like the 1993 film "Dave", well then you, too, see pretty much what the movie is like. This isn't to say that "Dave" is a copy or remake...more a reworking. And, as such both are much more than comedies and have a lot of nice romantic elements.

It's rather interesting that the film co-stars Kay Francis, as this once HUGE Hollywood star's career was in decline...yet she was given such a dandy script. Overall, it's a lovely film...one of Aherne's and Francis' best....with excellent acting, direction and more.