Ils étaient neuf célibataires

"France to the French!" A new law -which is not irrelevant today in some people's mind- stipulates that the aliens gotta get away.Then begins another crazy Guitry film ,another reductio ad absurdum that tends to show that "being honest" cannot be a job,so you've got to live outside the law to be a good man,and in the end ,the facts prove you right.

After hearing a woman (Elvire Popesco) complain about the French government which is about to drive her away of this beautiful country,Jean Lécuyer (alias Sacha Guitry) realizes that the only way for a woman to stay is to get married.An unconsummated marriage of course.That's his lucky break.He sets up a lucrative trade : an old bachelor's home where nine old men (most of them were former tramps)will wait for the ladies.

And what ladies! Marguerite Moreno is the stand out as a rich South American who made her fortune in...guano. In the office ,she wants to make sure that these men are too old to....And the tramp who marries her will have two sons-in-law:the cops(gendarmes) he used to meet on the streets when he was homeless.

Guitry 's lines are witty,funny as ever.Many puns,many mistaken identities (one of the men in his wife's house: she is a madam with her whores but he does think it's her numerous daughters),many absurd jokes : -You've got to be sixty to be admitted in this place.Are you? -Well,it's just a question of minutes!now seconds! Well I'm exactly sixty now! Guitry ,in 1939, even predates Julien Duvivier's "La Fête à Henriette" (1952) final unexpected twist !Guitry epitomized FRench wit at its best!

Sacha Guitry sees Elvire Popesco, but she's not interested. She's reading a newspaper article about the government preparing to throw out foreigners, and she's a Polish countess. So Guitry opens a home for old bachelors and collects nine poor, old men, and sells them off as husbands for foreign ladies who need marriages of conveniences: 50,000 each, half for him, half for them. And the ladies come, and they get married and the former bachelors are paid off, so they decide, with their new-found wealth, to leave and visit their wives.

It's a frothy farce, and given Guitry's connection not just to the film world but the theater, it's hardly surprising that he's cast the movie with a considerable amount of talent among the elders: Saturnin Fabre and Max Dearly are just two, and given the dictates of comedy, we can be sure that things will end happily, if not well. Guitry babbles reams of nonsense, and if cameraman Victor Arménise isn't given anything too difficult to do, at least Guitry understands he's making a movie and not a stage show, and offers a variety of settings for his clowns to appear on.

Grace and cynical wisdom in a movie full of talent, together with a striking choice of beautiful actresses.

I'm trying to think of a British or American film figure whose career is similar to Sacha Guitry's, and the nearest I can get is Preston Sturges ... who was himself quite French-influenced, having spent his formative years in Paris and being a lifelong Francophile.

Guitry was an original. An extremely prolific playwright, working in various forms but favouring naughty farces, he was also an actor and director, often starring in his self-directed plays and films. I'm only slightly familiar with his work, but people who know far more about him than I do have told me that 'Ils Étaient Neuf Célibataires' is his best film. It's certainly a distinctive work, though I found it only sporadically funny.

'They Were Nine Celibates' (as I translate the title) finds Guitry running a matrimonial agency in Paris. Half of his clientele are attractive young foreign ladies who want permanent resident status in France, and are willing to marry total strangers to get it. (Shades of Gérard Depardieu in 'Green Card'.) Each of these ma'mselles is a clearly defined national type. We get an exotic Chinese dancer (played by someone cried Princesse Chio), a strait-laced English Rose, a brassy American chanteuse, and so forth. Conveniently, all of these women are quite good-looking. Even more conveniently (and implausibly), all of these women are well-heeled ... financially, I mean. This last detail makes it hard for me to believe that they have no better alternative than Guitry's matrimonial agency.

The other half of Guity's clientele (the bachelors) are elderly pensioners, all native Frenchmen. It's understood that this is strictly a business arrangement: the husbands give their wives French citizenship in exchange for access to their wives' money. It's agreed that the husbands won't be given access to anything *else* (nudge, wink) of their attractive young wives' assets.

Ostensible hilarity ensues when the elderly husbands (being French, after all) decide they want the physical pleasures of their marriages. Meanwhile, Guitry has picked out the best bride for himself: a Polish countess.

This film has dated badly, and I can't help noticing that it was made in 1939: when people in France -- and in Europe generally -- had more pressing matters to occupy their attentions. I can see why a countess would be eager to get out of Poland in 1939, but why would she move to Paris? It would make more sense for her to reach Le Havre and board a transatlantic steamship.

The most interesting thing about this movie is the sexy ma'mselles ... partly because of their sex appeal, but largely because they represent the French perception of other nationalities. The Englishwoman represents the French stereotype of prim repressed Britons. The brassy chanteuse epitomises the French perception of all extrovert Yanks, and so forth. I'll rate this French trifle 4 out of 10.