Lo que desea toda mujer

Claudette Colbert is married to Richard Foran and is on her way on a second honeymoon when Richard's friend Don Ameche shows up minutes before they were supposed to leave for the train. It seems Claudette doesn't like to hear from him, as he is always asking Richard for help in his outlandish schemes. The latest one is that Don's boss thinks he's married, because not only did he tell him so, but he showed him a picture of his supposed wife. Claudette doesn't like the sound of this, and rightly so, because the picture of the lady in question is her. And, he now needs her to assist him to carry out this extended farce. Forced against her wishes, she goes with Don, leaving Richard behind due to a misunderstanding. Most of the rest of the film has Claudette with Don posing as his wife, while Richard is trying to get there. The film may sound pretty fun and laid-back with the stars involved, and while it does, it tries too hard to be zany and the situations feel forced, particularly when she decides to turn the tables on Don and act like she likes the position he's put her in. You could do a lot worse, even some of her own films. I've reviewed some of Claudette's pictures that are a lot worse, but considering the stars this feels more annoying in parts than it should. Chester Clute has a memorable bit as a shoe salesman on holiday in the big city, when he recognizes her, which would jeopardize her situation, and all he wants to do is check out her shoes and feet, because he knows his customers' feet! But all he can do is sneak about on the floor under the restaurants' tables, trying to get to her with no sense of direction, startling ladies and causing a commotion! "All I want to do is see her feet!" You may find this little film amusing, but by the end, you'll reach for something better.

This is one of those patented situation comedies that are repeatedly used in the movies or television. So and so has a job, and his boss is a believer in the sanctity of marriage. Somehow the boss learns that so and so is married, and has a nice marriage. When he gets an opportunity, the boss invites so and so and his wife to spend the weekend at his home...which panics so and so because he really is not married, but circumstances (ah, those perennial circumstances) have led to his having claimed he was married. Now his job and his future are on the line...what should he do?

Why, borrow the wife of his best friend, of course!

Variations appear everywhere: Christmas IN CONNECTICUT, for instance, has Barbara Stanwyck usurping the home of her friend Reginald Gardiner to impress her sanctimonious boss Sydney Greenstreet (who has another great "rounded" fat name - Alexander Yardley). On television a failed series in the middle 1960s was OCCASIONAL WIFE, which had an executive in a baby food company requiring a fake wife for the happiness of his employer. He uses his neighbor two floors beneath his apartment (the hero and heroin frequently have to meet on the fire escape of the apartment between theirs, leading to a running joke of the reaction of the man who owns that apartment. About the same time Jack Lemmon made his film GOOD NEIGHBOR SAM, where a married man has to help his neighbor (Romy Schneider) inherit her wealth by pretending he is her husband (Mike Connors). Connors reciprocates by pretending to be married to Lemmon's real wife Connie Stevens (leading to some complicated incidents of both men purposely making each other jealous -and almost driving neighbor Robert Q. Lewis crazy in the process).

Despite it's repetitive use it is not a bad plot, and in GUEST WIFE it was well handled. Here Ameche is a reporter for a newspaper - magazine chain, who has had to make up his marriage to make his copy more relevant. It has made Ameche a major news figure, and his boss (Charles Dingle, pleasantly using his pompous threatening characterization to comic use - and quite well) wants to meet the little woman, who behaved so bravely in the Far East. As Ameche has based her on Claudette Colbert (the wife of his best friend Dick Foran), he goes to Foran to get permission to borrow Claudette for a few hours (for dinner with Dingle). Foran is willing, but Colbert is tired of the number of times Ameche has somehow manipulated Foran into doing things for Ameche that were not in the interest of either Foran and Colbert.

But she goes along, until she finds that Dingle has become more plans for them in the coming weekend. Ameche, for fears for his job, willingly expands the time that Colbert is with him, but this slowly gets the formerly subservient Foran to resent his friend more and more. This leads to some nice pieces of comedy with hotel detective Grant Mitchell and with nosy neighbor Chester Clute. And Colbert, sensing an opportunity she won't miss, takes advantage of the situation to keep turning up the heat on a flustered Ameche. It turns out to be a nice little comedy, well worth viewing and even watching again.

Don Ameche steals the show in this black and white romantic comedy. Don Ameche is in wonderful form. He not only delivers his lines with perfection but his use of his eyes makes his character, Joe, come to life. This movie promises many laughs. Claudette Colbert also offers up a good performance as Mary, the wife that Joe borrows from his best friend Chris.

"I can tell more about a woman by looking at her feet than by looking at her face". Luckily "Mary" (Claudette Colbert) doesn't wear Wellington boots in this sometimes rather confusing comedy. She is happily married to docile bank manager "Chris" (Dick Foran) who, in turn, just happens to be best pal with writer "Joe" (Don Ameche). This latter chap has a problem. He has won an award - and an $1,000 honorarium, but he needs to acquire a wife in an hurry. Who better than "Mary"? She's none too keen on "Joe" nor on this wacky idea, but for the sake of a peaceable life she agrees. Imagine the confusion that causes at home when his boss sees his wife in the newspapers married to an altogether different man! Tongues will wag and there might even be a run on the bank! Well, enter onto the scene the redoubtable Charles Dingle's "Worth" and then add a dose of mischief from a "Mary" who has decided she is going to have some fun, and we are set fair for a standard screenplay that delivers predictably, but that also showcases Colbert's engaging talent with this flighty and amiable character and an Ameche who is on good form, too. The plot does recycle itself once or twice and the scenarios do contrive the humour a little, but this has enough different about it to avoid the usual "love triangle" type of scenario, there are a few enjoyable twists, and ever since her "Cleopatra" in 1934, Colbert can do little wrong in my book.

Guest Wife (Sam Wood, 1945) reunites the stars of the brilliant romantic comedy Midnight, as happily married Claudette Colbert ends up spending an inordinate amount of time posing as the wife of her husband's best friend (Don Ameche) in a bid to save the guy's job. It's OK, but the comic situations are often more stressful than funny, and the usually reliable Ameche is both cartoonish and flat. Still, Colbert does her best with the material, while character comedians Charles Dingle and Grant Mitchell work wonders in their supporting parts. Dozens of familiar faces crop up in small roles, including Irving Bacon, Harry Hayden and Chester Clute, playing a town gossip accused of voyeurism. The climactic sight gag is the best joke in the film.