Le plaisir des dames

When my friends ask me to name the absolutely worst movie I've ever seen, this is the one I always answer with. Considering Amateau's experience with comedy, and the quality of many of the cast members, this is a real disappointment. Maybe the saddest thing is watching David Niven trying to find the inspiration for a -- er -- feature on a statue his wife produced by skulking around lavatories, steam baths, and a bunch of other places. He looks vaguely embarrassed by it all, and really deserved a much better script. The trouble is, the production values of the film are too good for it to have much of a future on the midnight movie circuit. Plan 9, you're safe for now!

Alex Coppel is best known for his marvellous screenplay to 'Captain's Paradise' and his 'contribution' to 'Vertigo'. By all accounts he wrote a play called 'Chip, chip, chip.' One wonders where it was staged, if at all and who was in it!

He and Denis Norden have adapted it for this film directed by someone named Rod Amateau, an ex-stunt double most of whose directorial work was confined to the wonderful world of television.

Professor Alex Bolt is shocked to discover that the penis on the eighteen foot statue done of him by his renowned sculptress wife which is about to go on public display is decidedly not his own. He then embarks on an odyssey to discover whose amazing appendage it is and consequently behaves like a perfect dick, if you'll pardon the pun.

The actual premiss of the film is amusing and it begins rather well but alas quickly degenerates into an infantile, puerile and embarassing mess with the occasional funny line.

The outraged husband is played by David Niven who didn't make a decent film post 1963. Cinema goers tend only to remember the good ones which is just as well but as always he is saved by his immense charm. Robert Vaughn convinces as a slimy, opportunistic politician and as the sculptress Virna Lisi's smoky voice makes this viewer go weak at the knees. John Cleese is his customary forced, one-dimensional self. Ann Bell is haughty but naughty as Niven's assistant.

A fellow reviewer has very astutely noted a possible connection between this plot and the infamous Argyll divorce case of the early 1960's. The identity of the 'headless man' in the incriminating polaroid has never been truly established. It certainly wasn't Niven but by an amazing coincidence he had slept with the future 'Dirty Duchess' of Argyll when she was just fifteen which resulted in a secretly and speedily aborted pregnancy and they remained good friends until his death. Messrs. Coppel and Norden may or may not have drawn inspiration from the high society scandal but if they did the irony would certainly not have been lost on Mr. Niven.

The ultimate absurdity is when Niven's character discovers that the offending part has been copied from Michelangelo's 'David'. Although one of the greatest works of Renaissance sculpture, its genitalia is, in my humble opinion, nothing to write home about!

All-in-all a rather silly film that comes up short!

There are so many worthy cult movies from the 1970s that I (among many others) wish were released on DVD, so I can't understand why this forgotten bomb was resurrected on the format. Although they say that there is no bad premise, just bad executions of premises, the premise of this particular simply doesn't seem promising. David Niven looking to find out what man's sex organ was modelled for his sculpture wife's statue? To me, that sounds both desperate and lame. And the actual execution doesn't suggest that anyone in front of or behind the camera was trying. Indeed, the premise is so thin that there are big chunks of the movie where it's very clear that NOTHING of significance is going on. Maybe that wouldn't matter if the movie was funny, but it simply isn't. The only thing about the movie that will stick in your head after watching it is the infectious song "Charlie", which is played several times during the course of the movie.

This has got to be one of Niven's most embarrassing films. It is horrible, silly, low, insulting, insipid and stupid. Running around the world trying to see other men's privates and a pretty thin pretext for a plot. Hey, if a guy doesn't pay attention to his wife for years he shouldn't get all self righteous when he thinks she's fooling around. In a real sense he has committed adultery with this work as co-respondent. This movie is almost as insulting as "Impossible Years" where his character goes nuts over his daughter's virginity.

The statue is on the same comedic level as Benny Hill. But that's what we expect of Benny. Not of David Niven.

I saw this movie when it first came to theatres and forgot about it until just recently. I've looked for the DVD and found it on Ebay for almost $70 and on another site for $30. Any fans out there that can recommend a company that sells it for around $15 or $20? Don't want to be cheap, but I was young, young when I saw it and only remember laughing a lot.

Just for the record, David Niven is brilliant. I can't think of any role he didn't nail and I think he was probably a very nice fellow in his personal life...even tho...of course, that is completely none of my business. This paragraph is just filling space for the minimum amount of verbiage so I can post my search for a more reasonably priced DVD. Hope it isn't cheating!