The Smiling Lieutenant

There is more real sexuality between male and female in five minutes of a Lubitsch musical than in two and a half hours of any average film you're likely to see today. Needless to say, there is no nudity. It's all done with innuendo and the extraordinary degree of energy and physical magnetism that Lubitsch manages to elicit from all his actors. For once in a film, you actually feel that these extremely attractive young people can hardly wait to go to bed with each other, and when they do (off-screen of course) the result is … transformative. When they burst out in song, as they do on the slightest provocation in a Lubitsch musical, it is because they are full of emotions they can no longer contain. There's nothing dirty or smutty whatsoever in the Lubitsch Touch, as there is sometimes in the work of his disciple Billy Wilder. Lubitsch's characters explode with life, the joy of being young and in love. There are many great film directors, but not one has ever been able to create the kind of sexual energy that Lubitsch puts into all his films. Silly as the plots may be, mediocre as most of the songs are, his films bristle with the romance and humor of life.

Once more, thanks to TCM, we get the chance of watching this wonderful, charming, early talkie by the master of sophisticated comedy and innuendo, Ernst Lubitsch.

This is an absolutely entertaining and absorbing tale of a carefree, debonair Viennese Lieutenant, who falls for a violin player, thus finding his perfect sexual counterpart, but because of circumstances, becoming married to a prudish, mousey, princess.

Chevalier is the perfect "Smiling Lieutenant" of the title, singing in great from with his heavy trademark, french-accent. Colbert, in an early stage of her career, looks very different from her definitive trademark "Look", she acquired afterwards.....but is equally carefree, joyous and flirtatious. Miriam Hopkins is excellent as the princess, who falls madly in love with Chevalier, and who will do anything to have him!!

Just as it happened with "Trouble in Paradise", I really hope that this gem, as well as "Design for Living", "Monte Carlo", "The Love Parade", "Love Me Tonight", "One Hour With You", will become available on DVD, in decent form, as they deserve, as primary examples, of the long gone Pre-Code Era!!!

This film is sheer perfection - the Lubitsch Touch is here in spades. This must be one of the most charming films ever made, and it is technically brilliant too for the early talkie era. A fabulous show-case for the talents of three new Paramount stars - Maurice Chevalier has never been better, Claudette Colbert is buoyant - and Miriam Hopkins is an absolute marvel as the innocent princess. When will she be given the adulation she deserves - certainly one of the best actresses of her generation. And George Barbier is also brilliant as her father.

This film could only have been made in the pre-code days - it is very very naughty. The mating pillows is only one example of many sexual innuendos and symbols. But it is all too charming to be offensive to even the most prudish person. One of the best films of the early Thirties.

If you like cotton candy, or maybe a marshmallow sundae with sprinkles and a cherry on top, this picture will be among your favorites. What could be more appealing than a Lubitsch romantic comedy with its characteristic sly innuendos? Perhaps one that is set in a palace, with uniformed guards, ladies-in-waiting, and pageantry that no one takes seriously. More appealing than that? All of the above, with music. Want more? The casting is perfect: a flirtatious, mugging Chevalier; a young and nicely naughty Claudette Colbert; and most notably Miriam Hopkins effectively playing the extremes - a prim, virginal innocent who learns the ways of a vamp in order to hold her man. As her father, George Barbier contributes impressively, too. Great fun; one of Lubitsch's best.

Maurice Chevalier is way too hammy in this pleasant comedy. Claudette Colbert shines as the bad girl with a violin. Colbert displays her usual breezy charm AND a nice singing voice. But it's Miriam Hopkins who steals the film as the dowdy princess turned jazz baby. Colbert and Hopkins sing a delightful "Jazz Up Your Lingerie" number which Hopkins reprises on the piano, replete with frizzed hair and cigarette dangling from her lips as she pounds out a snazzy-jazzy version of the song. Hilarious! Hopkins rarely got to show her comic side. She was also funny in Wise Girl. Smiling Lieutenant also has Charlie Ruggles, Elizabeth Patterson, and the delightful George Barbier as Hopkins' papa. Good fun. Watch it for Hopkins and Colbert!!!