Divorcé malgré lui

This is a nice classic comedy about the romance between a bishop´s granddaughter and a successful magician. Although it isn´t a typical screwball comedy it has the usual charm of the 30´s. One of the things I most like in the film is the naturality of the characters and the relationships between them, without any superfual mildness. It´s also a film about marriage and divorce in a way that I find outstanding for that time and it´s full of funny and emotive situations in the way of films like Ernst Lubitsch Bluebeard´s Eighth Wife. In a funny way, i just want to comment one detail that makes me laugh but I don't know if that was the original intention. It is near to the end, when the magician is going to make one his most dangerous tricks and his assistant wants to stop him because is going to kill himself. The magician calls the police to take the assistant away from him and says: "arrest him, he is a communist!". And it wasn´t witch-hunt time yet!!

I saw this on an AMC DVD. It was not a very good print. Most scenes looked somewhat muddy. I hope someone releases a better print someday.

There is a lot of talent in bit parts here: Billie Burke, Eve Arden, Hugh Herbert, Zasu Pitts, and Broderick Crawford each contribute a few minutes of pleasantness.

I wasn't all that impressed with Loretta Young. She was fine, but I didn't see anything special that she brought to her role. On the other hand, David Niven was quite impressive. He brought just the right tone of bravado and cool to his part of a dare devil magician.

James Bond writer, Ian Flemming, wanted David Niven to play James Bond. You can see why from this film. He is handsome and suave in the Cary Grant manner, but he's also sly and intense. When he does a handcuffed falling out of a plane stunt, one really feels his fright and nervousness.

Niven did end up playing James Bond in the spoof "Casino Royale" (1967), but by that time he was about ten years too old for the part.

The movie jumps a bit. It looks like they edited out a number of scenes. Still, it is fast paced, clever and surprising. I recommend it, but I hope they come out with a better print.

David Niven and Loretta Young pledge to be "Eternally Yours" in this 1939 film also featuring Hugh Herbert, C. Aubrey Smith, Broderick Crawford, Eve Arden, Zasu Pitts, and Billie Burke.

Young plays Anita, who is engaged to Don (Crawford); however, she attends a performance by The Great Arturo (Niven), a Houdini-type who also reads minds and palms, and it's love at first sight for both of them. They marry, and she becomes part of his act, traveling full time all over the world.

Anita is hoping to settle down with Arturo and have a home and family. With the help of her grandfather (C. Aubrey Smith) she secretly builds her dream home. When she shows it to Arturo, he dismisses it. She leaves him, divorces him, and marries Don.

Light comedy with a charming cast. Young is beautiful, 26 at the time, and she and Niven work well together, as they did in one of my favorite movies, The Bishop's Wife.

People commented that this is a horrible plot, bad script, etc. It seemed pretty typical to me of the type of comedy done back then, no better, no worse.

David Niven was a remarkable man who died an awful death from ALS. An accomplished writer as well as actor, he was a gentleman through and through.

When he died, the porters at Heathrow sent a wreath that said, 'To the finest gentleman who ever walked through these halls. He made a porter feel like a king'.

If there was ever one thing every one could agree about David Niven is he had no small amount of debonair charm. It got him through many a film when the role required little else. I would say that is the case in Eternally Yours.

Loretta Young, granddaughter of Episcopalian minister C. Aubrey Smith, meets and falls in love with a magician. That would be David Niven. But he's more than a magician, he's the current Houdini wannabe who has skill as a hypnotist and an escape artist.

Niven likes the life of a traveling entertainer, but Loretta wants to settle down with a home. After a death defying leap from a plane when he's handcuffed behind him, Young can't deal with the tension any more and she leaves him. He finds he can't go on without her, but she ups and divorces him and marries Broderick Crawford.

Of course the rest of the film is about Niven winning Young back in the best tradition of Cary Grant who may very well have been offered this part before Niven. Loretta is certainly worth winning back. I'm betting that Ralph Bellamy turned down the Ralph Bellamy part so Broderick Crawford was cast. Niven enjoys tweaking him in this film, but I'm not sure why unlike Bellamy who was usually a well meaning goof, Crawford didn't just punch him out.

The climax takes place at the 1939 World's Fair and you might want to see Eternally Yours for some nostalgia footage of that event. But it is a film that really does get by on the charm of its leads.

Watching a beat up copy on Tubi in 2022.... Wonder if anyone else noticed at the start of the opening credits the title reading '"Movies for Television"? Television was in it's earliest stage then and with World's Fair promising so many future advancements, this seemed to be a nice tie-in at the time.

Of course, the impeccable David Niven and lovely Loretta Young carry this film along...but Eve Arden adds fun to the production. Of course, to me, this is the same person nearly unchanged in her real TV program "Our Miss Brooks" which I grew up watching as a child!

And, it's interesting to see a very young Broderick Crawford playing a nice guy early in his career.