La sage-femme, le curé et le bon Dieu

This sex comedy from 1962 isn't entirely without its charms, but some of the content is objectionable (even considering the period), and it gets awfully muddled and dull in its second half. On the positive side, there's Angie Dickinson puttering around on her Vespa on the windy mountain roads overlooking the sea in the gorgeous town of Forza d'Agrò, which was also one of the locations used in The Godfather. Sentimentally, I liked seeing 74-year-old Maurice Chevalier sing a couple of tunes, even if the degree to which is character, a priest, is involved in the sex lives of the villagers seemed a little odd. All the ogling of Dickinson early on gets a little wearisome, mostly because it just seems unimaginative, but the candor with which everyone talks about the libido of both sexes and how the wives decide to take a page out of Aristophanes and go on a sex strike made me smile.

On the downside, the film takes attitudes that haven't aged well, which in itself isn't surprising and something I'd normally try to accept and learn from, but it crossed a line with the spousal abuse humor. The men have a right to expect sex from their wives, you see, and so when they hold out, they can be knocked around, and some of them appearing with garish black eyes the following morning. One of the jokes is that the husband also has a black eye, but I found no solace in that. This was part of acceptable humor of the period, e.g. Jackie Gleason regularly threatening to sock Audrey Meadows in the kisser six years earlier on the TV show 'The Honeymooners,' but when it's clear punching actually has occurred and no big deal, it's tough to enjoy.

To some extent I probably would have excused the film for those moments, but it also goes downhill when it starts trying to maneuver Dickinson's character into a romance with a character played by Gabriele Ferzetti. I found the scenes between them bland and uninteresting, taking away from Dickinson's flirtation with the villagers or the dynamic with the wives, one of whom is played by Sylva Koscina, who is unfortunately underused. As it plays out, all of the bite and playfulness is sucked out of the film, leading to a rather humdrum ending.

An attractive young blonde woman (Angie Dickinson), who is a midwife, arrives for work in a Sicilian village and the men ogle over her. This action alienates the local women. As a group, they decide to forgo sex with their men. Without sex, they get even with their husbands. Also, without sex there are no babies. Without babies, there is no need for a midwife. The village priest, Father Antonio (nicely played by Maurice Chavalier), aware of what is happening, has his hands full. The irony is that some of the women are just about Ms. Dickinson's equal (like Sylva Koscina and Rosanna Rory). The last scene is a howl! Harmless fluff!

Maurice Chevalier and agnes moorerhead were predictably terrible ...silva koscina carried her own weight but the rest of the cast was boring BORING boring ... the morale is you cannot put a beautiful american woman in an italian community without the women there getting upset because all their loser men go lusting after a blonde with nice curves

Jessica is an American lady (Angie Dickenson) who has inexplicably come to a small Italian town to be their midwife. What is a super-hot American doing there?! And what is the town to do? All the men spend all their time lusting after her and the women spend all their time complaining that their men are lusting after sweet Jessica. The town priest (inexplicably played by the French actor, Maurice Chevalier) tries to get everyone to accept Jessica--but it looks like it's an impossible task.

"Jessica" is a comedy that never really hits the mark--and its script clearly could have used a lot more work before it was filmed. As a comedy, it was supposed to be funny but it wasn't. Sadly, it was just pretty dull and it isn't particularly charming. As a result, the film just drags despite nice scenery.

Great scenery and great girls! Pity Angie comes in about 3rd in the "glamour stakes"! It is a light-hearted romp though and is mildly entertaining. Chevalier does his usual bit in his usual style-talking to himself,the audience,his jeep,his god and his congregation,with a big cheesy grin(the old ,"I'm glad I'm not young anymore"routine. Oh golly,I've got to write more lines!How about,Angie's love interest,the titled "heavy" of the film,tortured by the memory of his wife's execution by the Nazis,has little more than a walk on,walk off role.I guess he is there to ensure a happy ending. Angie doesn't do to bad,from village midwife to grand dame in the château-in less than a year.Beats having the stuffing knocked out of you by a demented Michael Caine!