Paradise for Three

The Tobler Soap Company has sponsored a slogan contest that an unemployed young man (Robert Young) wins and the owner of the company (Frank Morgan) places second (!). They both win a two weeks vacation at a fancy resort in the Alps. For the trip Morgan's Rudolph Tobler decides to go incognito and uses the name he won the contest under – Edward Schultz. The movie revolves around mistaken identities – who is rich and who is poor. The snobby hotel head staff (the wonderful Herman Bing and Sig Ruman) and the gold digging Astor character think Young is wealthy and Schultz poor. In the hopes that he will leave the hotel, Bing and Ruman give Schultz not a guest room but the crummiest little room in the hotel. To spice things up, Astor finds out that it is Schultz who is wealthy, Schultz (i.e., Tobler's) daughter (Florence Rice) shows up and immediately falls for Young, and along with her comes Tobler's long time – and nagging – housekeeper played by Edna Mae Oliver. The cast – especially Edna Mae Oliver and Frank Morgan make this movie a delight. It was also fun to see Jack Norton playing yet another drunk – this time at a water fountain. Talk about being typecast! And what an impressive (and somewhat sad) list of uncredited actors – Gustav von Seyffertitz, and Anna Q Nilsson for heaven's sake. Except for the crummy skiing scenes, this movie is a joy to see.

MGM certainly used a low budget to make PARADISE FOR THREE, and it shows when it comes to the outdoor winter scenes supposedly taking place on ski slopes at an Alpine resort. The use of process photography for all those mountain tops covered with snow is obvious.

Nor did they use a top cast but the results are splendid nevertheless.

An up and coming Robert Young has the star role of a contest winner who is mistakenly thought to be a millionaire by Herman Bing and Sig Rumann when he arrives at his destination at a swank hotel. He immediately attracts the attention of Mary Astor, hard on her luck as far as money is concerned and looking for an easy catch.

But the fun begins when Frank Morgan decides to check on how the hotel treats the lower class and finds himself mistaken for a mere contest winner without money. The pretty blond Florence Rice plays his daughter who naturally falls in love with penniless Robert Young, who doesn't know she's a rich girl until the final reel.

It's predictable and silly, with great support from Edna May Oliver as Morgan's housekeeper of thirty years who joins the group at the hotel to look out for Morgan's health and keeps an eye on his "woman trouble" with Astor. She makes the most of an amusing role in true Edna May Oliver fashion.

This is one that's little known today. To put it in context, it probably played the lower half of bills in the "double feature" days which is why I call it a programmer. I wouldn't be surprised if it's one of those B-films that surprised audiences by being more entertaining than the main feature, which happened occasionally.

This is sort of the reverse of the sublime, and rarely shown "Easy Living." In that, working girl Jean Arthur is treated to life as a rich person. Here, tycoon Frank Morgan masquerades as an average Joe.

The cast could (with the exception of Robert Young, though he is OK here) scarcely be improved on. Mary Astor graces anything in which she appears. She was one of the true greats. Edna May Oliver, Frank Morgan, Herman Bing … They're all fine and here work well as an ensemble.

The title is a bit misleading. It sounds racy and, though there are some faux naughty scenes involving devious divorcée Astor, it is good clean fun. I wonder who actually are the three?

Nevertheless, it's a charmer: not a great movie but a highly appealing one.

A delightful little comedy, A rich widower tycoon, under iron control of the dictator at home, the governess for the whole family - the father and the daughter. The man (Morgan) has his escapades - nothing romantic, or I will say romantic with respect to the other gender. But the governess, officially only housekeeper, Mrs Kunkel (Edna Mae Oliver) won't let him blink without her permission (nothing romantic here either, she behaves more like a strict and watchful mother). Naturally the baby inside him wants to break free, and gets the chance when his slogan gets selected as one of the prize-winning slogans, submitted under assumed name (of his own company, but clearly not influenced). The reward is a fortnight in Alps and he grabs at the opportunity with both hands. He takes his butler with him, to avoid Mrs Kunkel's suspicion. But she is smarter than he thought. Again as usual motherly feelings, she ensures that thought incognito, but he is well taken care of at the hotel, by calling the manager and telling that the a millionaire incognito is arriving as a prize winner and the necessary care should be accorded (including a pair of siamese kittens - Morgan's favourite pet). In hotel, since the name wasn't told, not even the assumed name, the first of the two winners to arrive, Fritz Hagedorn (Young) an unemployed man, is mistaken for the millionaire and given all attentions, by hotel as well as a gold-digger, Mrs Irene Mallebre (Astor) - till she identifies the right one from the behaviour of the second winner who was really the millionaire. She arranges to get herself in a compromising position - which would get her the man or a few millions (under breach of promise). Meanwhile, warned by the accompanying Butler, Mrs Kunkel has arrived and with her, with opposite intention, the daughter, to see that her father is allowed to have his fun and Mrs Kunkel doesn't spoil it. The daughter promptly falls in love with the actual pauper. Who for a change, doesn't hide his financials from her, and agrees to fall in love (or express it) only when she too masquerades as a poor, working girl (paid poor relative and companion of rich aunt Mrs Kunkel). Now both the father and daughter are in mess due to their masquerade - one under breach of promise, and other due to lying, pretending to be poor, to get her man. Sorting that out is never much of trouble in stories, but here there had been some innovative ways. Good screwball comedy, not something too new as a story, (but may be at that time it was a novel one ? ) but that doesn't reduce the enjoyment quotient.

The movie doesn't have any politics, so I am surprised why some of the reviewers have to bring that in here. We may discuss those aspects when the movie itself is political. The background - Austrian - had been kept since the original story was that way, and it tried to remain faithful to it. The story was of 1924 - much before the Nazis had really assumed the power. The writer of the story, by the way, was pacifist - which neither of the warring sides were, and to the credit of Nazis, he had been interrogated, kept under observation, but neither put behind bar, not stopped from moving out of the country - and he always came back to it. Anyway I too shouldn't go into politics, there are movies where that could be taken up during review - both of UFA as well as Hollywood - since both were equally biased and wrong.

I read the original novel "Drei MŠnner I'm Schnee" many years ago when I was an undergrad at my university and thought at the time it would make a fun movie. To my great delight I watched "Paradise for Three" not knowing it was adapted from that book and was more than pleased when I recognized the story. Frank Morgan was always one of my favorite actors, Robt Young was at his youthful and handsome best and Ms Rice was, as could only be expected, exceptionally beautiful as Tobler's daughter. The manager and butler at the hotel were classic and hilarious -- a more appropriate cast would have been difficult to assemble.

I doubt if today's youth would appreciate such a movie, but those of us who like the old ones definitely would. What a shame to realize that the setting was Vienna in 1938, a city destined to be overrun by Hitler's hordes and its society shattered within 2 years.