Travessuras de Casados

Back in the '50s, a common sitcom episode was the married couple finding out that they're not legally married.

"We're Not Married," a 1952 film, has five such couples, including Fred Allen and Ginger Rogers, Marilyn Monroe and David Wayne, Eve Arden and Paul Douglas, Eddie Bracken and Mitzi Gaynor, and Louis Calhern and Zsa Zsa Gabor.

There were several episodic, anthology-type films from this period. "We're Not Married" deals with five very different couples and what the notice of non-marriage means to each couple. There's a wealthy man (Calhern) married to a gold digger (Gabor), a bickering husband and wife radio couple (Allen and Rogers), a couple in a slump (Paul Douglas and Eve Arden), an ambitious young woman and her husband (Monroe and Wayne) etc.

The best is the Calhern-Gabor, and Allen and Rogers make a good team and give bright performances. There are some funny sequences throughout.

Mores have changed a lot since this film, but it makes for pleasant watching with good direction by Edmund Goulding.

This is another early Marilyn Monroe picture; in this case, it's a compendium of stories involving a handful of marriages – presided over by reliable Victor Moore – which are discovered to have been illegal because his term of office hadn't yet officially started when the ceremony was performed! So, he's made to send each of these a letter explaining the awkward situation and, according to where they stand at that particular moment in their married life, see how they decide to act upon it. The couples are played by Fred Allen and Ginger Rogers, David Wayne and Marilyn Monroe, Paul Douglas and Eve Arden, Louis Calhern and Zsa Zsa Gabor, and Eddie Bracken and Mitzi Gaynor. The least episode is the one with Douglas and Arden, where the latter becomes suspicious of just what goes on during the former's business trips; the Calhern-Gabor episode is mildly interesting for having her turn out a schemer – planning to appropriate her husband's fortune with the help of shyster lawyer Paul Stewart…until he's saved by the propitious arrival of Moore's letter!; Wayne has a hard time adjusting because of Monroe's triumph in a "Mrs. Mississippi" contest – believing his troubles over when the marriage is revealed to have been null, his 'wife' promptly enrolls in a "Miss Mississippi" competition (which, naturally, she wins); Bracken is a soldier who goes AWOL in order to consolidate his wedding vows when it transpires that his child (whose birth is imminent) may be declared illegitimate – Lee Marvin appears briefly as Bracken's buddy in this, one of the two most satisfying episodes; the other is the one featuring constantly-bickering pair Rogers and Allen, which unbearable situation threatens to sink their early-morning radio show (where they're ironically billed as the ideal married couple)! Again, the film is handled with utmost professionalism – and is undeniably entertaining while it's on – but which now feels dated and undistinguished.

WE'RE NOT MARRIED was a terrific film--highly enjoyable and in a format very reminiscent of a great old film, IF I HAD A MILLION (1932). Both stories have many small stories that are all connected by a common theme. In MILLION, a variety of strangers are given a million dollars and the impact of this on their lives is explored. Here in WE'RE NOT MARRIED, the theme is that six marriages turn out NOT to be legal! It seems that the justice of the peace jumped the gun and married these couples just before his license took effect! You hear about the first case they discovered and then the rest of the film follows the remaining five couples. Most of the stories are comical and even the more serious ones still have a funny twist.

Each story is excellent, though probably the weakest of these is the one, unfortunately, that gets the most attention when you look up the title on IMDb. This is because it happens to co-star Marilyn Monroe. While she is just fine in the film, she really has little to do other than to look pretty and her role is one of the smaller ones in the film--so naturally publicity department guys plastered her all over posters and video cases!! In fact, no one star dominated in the film--it was truly a group effort. And, fortunately, none of the stories were poor and a few were simply terrific (especially the Louis Calhern/Zsa Zsa Gabor one as well as the Eddie Bracken/Mitzi Gaynor ones).

By the way, one of the other better skits has an interesting story. The Fred Allen/Ginger Rogers story is quite good, but Fred ALSO used this bit on the radio and made it a good bit funnier. Along with Tallulah Bankhead, Fred did the same sappy and commercial ridden bit on the radio. Then, he did the same bit again with Tallulah assuming the couple were having a really, really bad day. They slap the kid and call her names, they shoot the canary and have a thoroughly miserable morning. Having this story end this way in the film would have been great, but instead a more conventional ending was used. And by the way, I am NOT old enough to remember this radio bit--but I heard it on a record album a while back featuring great radio bits.

The chief virtue of this film is the marvelous casting, which could hardly be better. And there's a pleasing variety to the episodes. That said, the edge to the writing and direction is definitely not as keen as one would like. To give just one example of the problem: A letter is sent to each couple, telling them that, through a technicality, they're not really married. In the opening sequence, we hear the letter dictated. At the appropriate point in each installment, the letter is introduced with a special musical theme, and the reader of the letter reacts appropriately. But then, each time, just to make the point completely clear, we are shown a close-up of the identically worded letter. Another example: Paul Douglas dreams of dates with beautiful girls, AND DREAMS, AND DREAMS... Also, though one suspects that Fred Allen had a hand in the writing of his sequence--a parody of radio breakfast couples--here, too, the satire is a little too obvious, their banter being merely a string of not especially clever product plugs (one of them having the miracle ingredient, chicken fat).

Calhern rises above the heavily ironic divorce-lawyer skit, and James Gleason gives one of his finest performances as a hick hustler promoting Marilyn Monroe in a fledgling Mrs. America contest. Had the rest of the film been as sharp as Gleason's well written and well performed characterization, it could have been a classic. The final sequence is the most successful, because of the fine, unaffected performances of Gaynor and Bracken (particularly the latter) and probably also because Goulding was most at home with this simple romance. A point of interest in the film as a whole is how much attitudes about marriage have changed since the film was made.

AMC has shown an amusing deleted sequence with Walter Brennan in its HIDDEN HOLLYWOOD series.

Just watched this on Netflix Streaming. In this one, Victor Moore plays a justice of the peace who presided over six weddings before his license to do so took effect. That means none of those couples are legally married. An explanation of one of them is provided in discussion so only five is seen as depicted on screen: Fred Allen and Ginger Rogers are the first we actually meet and see attempting to get hitched just before they start their morning radio show. They're the funniest as they argue just before airtime before then acting all lovey-dovey plugging various sponsors. Reminds me of an actual skit Allen did with Tallulah Bankhead on his actual radio show in which they also played a married couple on the air doing both the lovey and bickering version of their banter that I heard once on a long playing 33 1/3 rpm record back in the late '80s. The next segment has Marilyn Monroe as a Mrs. America contestant while hubby David Wayne is taking care of their baby and doing housework. Then there's Eve Arden and Paul Douglas as a slightly boring couple with Douglas doing a little fantasizing with other women when he gets his letter. The next one has Louis Calhern as a Dallas oil executive (talk about coincidence as this is my next review concerning original "Dallas" cast members in my movie/TV appearances list in chronological order though the cast member I'm referring to here was Wayne who was the first Digger Barnes there) who gets a divorce summons from Zsa Zsa Gabor (known for many such cases herself in her real-life future). And, finally, there's Eddie Bracken as an Army man who doesn't want his pregnant wife-Mitzi Gaynor-to birth an illegitimate child while he's away. Like I said, the first segment was the funniest with the Monroe/Wayne, Calhern/Gabor, and Arden/Douglas ones also providing some laughs but the most touching is the last one. By the way, it's fascinating seeing Lee Marvin in that one not playing a tough guy. In summary, We're Not Married is quite a good mix of various short stories put in one feature.