Cary Grant, de l'autre côté du miroir

The Cary Grant/Archibald Leach story is a treasure trove almost impossible to fail at. In fact it's such a compelling story that despite the failings of the director one does stay through to the end watching this tale. And personally I don't have a problem with missing bits of the story like other reviewers do or with the somber tone of the story. The somber tone, is an integral part of Cary's life, and as long as the director tells the story I think he does have the right to omit parts that don't fit into the story he wishes to tell.

On the other hand I did find his pretentiousness very annoying. Having such a wonderful source material the director Mark Kidel had to show how he entered Cary Grant's mind and deciphered his innermost secrets. So he keeps on showing us scenes from Grant's therapeutic sessions with LSD pretending he knows what Grant saw there. It's groundless, pretentious and completely unnecessary for the story itself. But it's being repeated over and over again, and I found it to be detrimental to the movie

Disappointing doc. Doesn't really tell us anything new about Cary Grant. The filmmakers had access to his private films, but present no context for us to interpret them. (Mostly shots of pretty actresses. Was he auditioning future lovers?) The footage of his mother is interesting. You can't help but look at her footage for signs of mental illness. He had serious mommy issues, but why didn't he have serious daddy issues, too? (His dad had abandoned the family and started a new family with someone else.) Betsy Drake recommended LSD treatment to him, which gave him great insight into his relationships with women. (i guess old-fashioned "talk therapy" wasn't cool back then?) When his Eureka moment happened, we aren't told WHEN. Before Dyan Cannon? Before his last marriage to Barbara?

I would recommend this documentary to people who don't know nuttin' about him. For people familiar with his films and biography, not so much.

How can you do this "documentary" without discussing the years he lived with Randolph Scott. I heard not one reference to this part of his life. I don't know if they were gay or not, and I don't really care, but I've read they had a very close relationship.

The film is incomplete without it.

I agree with the other reviewer that it is perfectly extraordinary in 2017 that a documentary of Cary Grant should fail not only to discuss in any way his reltionship with Randolph Scott, with whom he lived, more or less as a couple, for more than ten years but does not even once mention Scott's name. While spotting "gay" tendencies in figures of the past can be a very tedious sport, there is not really any serious doubt about Grant's bisexuality and a biography that ignores it, while talking extensively of his difficulty in discovering who he was, is ridiculous. Had the film been made fifty years ago, one would understand, but in 2017 it is almost beyond belief. It is not as if any of it makes one jot of difference to the fact that he was a marvellous actor! or for that matter detracts in any way from his stature as a person. Even though one appreciates that the omission is out of respect for the views of Grant's daughter, who appears in the film, It is still crass dishonesty on the part of the film-maker and rather foolish jealous denial of the past on the part of the descendant.

Interesting psychological and existentialist documentary on Hollywood star Cary Grant. There is some about his career, including the very begining as an acrobat in England and singing in Broadway. However, the great enphasis lies on the obscure man beging the glamourous Cary Grant: Archie Leach. Serious family problems, LSD treatment and other experiments and therapies, a bad "serial" husband, dubious sexuality and potential mysoginy... many issues are explored in varied depth in its less than one hour length. With lots of grrat footage, the film also highlights his roles in cinema in which Cary Grant faces somehow Archie Lech, the man behind the mirror.