Enfin l'amour

An homage to 30s musicals, this vastly underrated film features tongue-in-cheek performances by Cybill Shepherd and Burt Reynolds, and terrific comedy turns by Eileen Brennan and Madeline Kahn.

Kahn does a great, obscure Cole Porter (all music in this film) called "Find Me a Primitive Man"; Brennan shines in the "Gentlemen Don't Want Love" number. Duilio del Prete, Mildred Natwick, and John Hillerman are also quite good.

Many obscure Porter songs and a few well-known ones. The costumes and sets are nice and evoke the 30s with the star blacks and whites with hints of beige. While the dancing may be a little rough, the stars more than make up for it in their zest and obvious enjoyment of the material.

The entire cast has fun with this slight story of changing partners until each finds at long last love. Reynolds might be a tad too silly but Shepherd has fun and display a great set of pipes. Ultimately, Brennan and Kahn make this one worth catching.

This is definitely a case of people running around saying a film is terrible they've probably never seen. Upon release, the film was trashed, probably partially because of its type of cinema being out of favor (this was Scorsese/Altman time) and because of people's annoyance with Bogdanovich and Shepard on talk shows and such. But with time as a distancer, watch this film and dare to tell me it isn't superiour to "Everyone Says I Love You" in every way! I LIKE "Everyone says..." but this film, with its cinematography, and its use of Cole Porter tunes to advance the plot, while uneven, is much more ambitious than the charming Allen film. If you didn't like the Allen film, you may well not like this -- but Reynolds, Shepard, Eileen Brennan singing, which got trashed upon release, is just as good as Roberts, Norton et al warbling in "Everyone." This is a funny, unique work that does occasionally suffer from the cutes -- but so what? Polly Platt, Bogdanovich's ex-wife, always talks about this as one of his "he's no good after he left me" examples, but at least his musical retains its music (she's one of the creators of James L. Brooks' "I'll Do Anything"). This film is a target from so many for no good reason. I recommend this and "Nickelodeon", another overlooked Bogdanovich picture, to be rediscovered as the just plain good films they are!

I'm a bit perplexed regarding what to say about this movie. First off, I think I enjoyed it more when I saw it years ago than I did now. But I think that was mainly because of the choice of songs. Cole Porter wrote all sorts of songs, but the movie goes for the particularly witty and urbane choices, including a number I hadn't heard before.

The style of the movie has giddy improvisational style, as actors often seem to be chatting amongst themselves or making quiet asides. This is true not just in conversation, but in song as well, and it's clear the intention is to make the songs work as a continuation of the story and the characterization. It's an interesting approach that I found somewhat likable in conversation but not so much in songs, because it often completely trashes the melodies.

Unfortunately, Bogdonavich was apparently of the opinion that a musical requires very little musical talent. Reynolds is a decidedly poor singer. Shepards can at least carry a tune, but it's hard to imagine anyone casting her as the lead in a musical who wasn't dating her.

The supporting players do better. None of them are great singers either, but Eileen Brennan, John Hillerman, Madelein Kahn and that guy no one's ever heard of all understand how to sell a song. They would make great second bananas behind actors who were strong singers (or dancers, as was the case with Astaire or Kelly musicals), but instead they overshadow the leads, which is a little sad.

The story is simple, essentially a matter of flirting and coupling among the four. Then ending is unsatisfactory.

I've heard there are numerous edits of this movie floating around, and that some work better than others. I saw the version released on VHS, which is apparently neither the best nor the worst version out there. (I've heard the best version is on Netflix and DVD.)

This isn't as terrible as some people claim, and it has some nice touches throughout, but it comes across as a bit of a vanity project in which a director with no experience in musicals nor much sense of what makes them work decided to put his girlfriend in one.

To make up for the sound trashing this film has received in many quarters since its release, some cult fans go to the opposite extreme. This is neither a neglected gem nor a piece of crap, but an interesting experiment. Using actors who aren't singers must have been a conscious choice (although we can't help wondering what Cybill Shepard thinks of a strategy that nearly finished her career) in the manner of Woody Allen's "Everyone Says I Love You" (but Allen's film DOES achieve true glories, such as Hawn's dance along the Seine, that Bogdanovich does not). Most worthwhile element: extensive use of alternate Cole Porter lyrics that one rarely hears. It's greatest sin upon its release was probably in being itself: an off-kilter experiment with "tradition" during a time that didn't care for musicals much in the first place. I'm becoming increasingly interested in 70s musical "disasters" b/c they're worth seeing.

Bogdonovich & company made this with endless tongue in cheek, and as an homage to the stage musicals of the 20s and stage AND film musicals of the 30s - glib, off-handed, seemingly "UN-artful" if you will. Also, the actors all sang - or spoke - their songs IN REAL TIME, in what was a brave attempt to duplicate the reality and presence of a live production.

Obviously, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I clearly saw this film much more in the spirit on Bogdonovich's vision than those who wemt in looking for something else. I feel a lot of baggage was brought to this film by the audience, and the movie was never really "seem" or "heard" by them. Too bad, because technically this is how musicals SHOULD be made.

I enjoyed the movie very much, and lament that it isn't available to allow everyone to make up their own mind about how well the vision of the director, cast, Musical Director and all concerned was carried out.