Vivons un peu

A simply average comedy most notable for bringing Anna Sten out of Hollywood flopland--at least box office flopland. She shows a real flair for comedy as a spoiled rotten cosmetics queen with an eye on Robert Cummings,who is masterminding her advertising campaigns.

But Cummings is Overworked to the 200th degree and suddenly realizes he's falling in love with the female psychiatrist he's been seeing(Lamarr),who doesn't want to upset the doctor-patient relationship. And Lamarr's officemate Shayne has deep feelings for Lamarr.(This is Shayne's biggest part before he was demoted to TV character actor).

If you think you recognize Cummings's male officemate,you do. He played "Mr. Macy" in MIRACLE ON 34th STREET.

Wilbur Mack is the patient Cummings encounters in Lamarr's office--"You're crazy! The only difference between us is--I KNOW IT!" This is the sort of picture that's neither good NOR bad---just an actor's pet project.

This B-feature has several strengths that give it potential, as the three main characters are all well cast and acted, and the subject matter is just as topical now as it was then. It also makes numerous efforts to be creative in the use of double exposures and other such techniques. Though it does not capitalize on all of its opportunities, it's a solid movie that's worth seeing.

The story focuses on the ways that romantic attentions, both wanted and unwanted, can get tangled up with workplace and professional responsibilities. It sets up a lot of possibilities, though much of the time the script settles for light humor rather than trying to get more out of a given scene. It does work well enough as a light romantic comedy, and indeed many other movies over the years have had the same options and have made the same choices.

Hedy Lamarr gives the best performance, as a psychiatrist/author whose professional and personal feelings become intertwined. Her character is interesting, and it's a little unfortunate that her dialogue was not written more carefully. But she does quite well with what she has to work with. Anna Sten works well as an amorous cosmetics tycoon. Robert Cummings is believable and likable as an advertising executive, although he sometimes portrays his character as a bit too much of a bungler. Robert Shayne is adequate, though often rather dull, as the fourth of the major characters.

Overall, "Let's Live a Little" is a decent movie to watch as light entertainment when you don't want to think too much. Its low-budget look and its general avoidance of the more interesting possibilities keep it from being much more, but a movie like this can be worth watching if your expectations aren't too high.

The situation has potential. A stressed-out ad man meets a beautiful shrink. Object: psychiatric humour. And maybe a little romance.

Unfortunately, the result could best be described as innocuous, like some sort of benign medical condition.

Bob Cummings plays his usual amiable self. But the real reason anyone would watch this film is, of course, Hedy Lamarr. She looks the way one would expect Hedy Lamarr to look in 1948. Fantastic. She is forced to wear an off-the-shoulder gown at one point to better show off her ... scintillating jewellery. The real conundrum is how Hedy avoided being the top pin-up of World War II. Maybe it was the saltpetre they put in the army chow.

Hedy's real-life role as a torpedo guidance system designer -- apparently that story about her is absolutely on the level -- is easier to accept now after seeing her as a no-nonsense, supercilious psychiatrist, sort of an early prototype for Dr. Lilith Sternin Crane.

The two Roberts -- Cummings and Shayne -- compete for the attention of Hedy. This gets a little childish with Shayne trying to pump himself up physically at one point. Also, characters often gaze at one another, then see the other person transformed inside a shimmering aura into the object of their true desire. Funny, but both these plot elements -- childish male competitiveness, and idealized shimmering figures -- appeared in a far superior film, "The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer", the previous year, 1947. I'm sure it's just a coincidence.

The film has some silly "psychological" dream sequences which are played for laughs, and which for contemporary audiences may have been a mild spoof on Hitchcock's "Spellbound" from 1945.

Anyway, it's too bad that all this seems to add up to so little in the end. Bob Cummings co-produced this film. It's a pity he couldn't have hired a script doctor.

Whatever possessed HL to appear in this ridiculous film which panders to the worst excesses of male chauvinism prevalent in Hollywood in 1948.I fully endorse "cheeseplease's" comments.We all know HL was intelligent (co-designer of an electronic torpedo guidance system patented with a male colleague) as well as being very beautiful and I had hopes in this film she would espouse tracts of Freud/Junge and show us her innate well bred poise and intelligence.What we got, or rather what she was "saddled" with, was some airhead of a Hollywood scriptwriter & producer giving us the most facile, unfunny, badly constructed so-called "comedy" screenplay I have seen in a long while.

I too found nothing to laugh at in this contrived one dimensional film.I presume that by 1948 in this "B" feature, Hedy was getting rather desperate for good scripts or needed the money.The same goes for Robert Cummings.(How mush better he was in Hitchcock's "Saboteur" (1945) with Priscilla Lane or even his "Dial M For Murder (1953)with Grace Kelly.The subject film never touched on psychiatry presumably because the screen writer and producer knew nothing about it and patronisingly considered it an unfunny subject for American audiences in 1948.That just exposes their ignorance when films like Hitchcock's "Spellbound" (1945) had been filmed.Silly irritating sequences of both leads imagining each other's faces superimposed on other peoples bodies really annoyed me.How could two rational people who had reached an elevated position in their respective careers appear so foolish?Pulling silly faces or reacting in a crass way in these sequences is certainly not funny to an intelligent audience.

Why then did I purchase this DVD?Well I had hopes of seeing another good performance by HL like she played in "Come Live With Me"(1941) a witty and literate film opposite Jimmy Stewart.I rate the latter as her best film ever as her own character has verisimilitude as an Austrian refugee - albeit a very beautiful one.At least it is another rare HL film in my collection of her.Verdict - 3/10 could do better.

Advertising executive Bob Cummings is having a nervous breakdown. His advertising campaign for make-up is being whipsawed by the client, his former fiancee Anna Sten. His boss tells him to deal with something entirely different, a book by psychiatrist J. O. Loring, who turns out to be Hedy Lamarr. She has a partner and love interest in Robert Shaye, and this romantic comedy will play out about as you expect it will.

Director Richard Wallace has a fine farceur and minor slapstick talent in Cummings, but the other three don't add anything to the laughs. Mary Treen offers some cynical amusement as Miss Lamarr's receptionist, and other comics on hand include Billy Bevan, Byron Foulger, and Lucien Littlefield. The result is a decent but not consistently funny comedy, although you can always look at Miss Lamarr during the slow spells while the plot plays out.