Capital Celluloid 2026 — Day 205: Fri Jul 24

Midnight (Liesen, 1939): Garden Cinema, 6pm

This is part of the Garden Cinema's Screwball Comedy season. Full details here.

Time Out review:
An enchanting comedy which starts with Claudette Colbert, as an American chorine on the make, stranded in Paris in a gold lamé evening gown (what else?). She is befriended on the one hand by a poor taxi-driver who is really a Russian count (Don Ameche), and on the other by a wealthy socialite (John Barrymore) who 'introduces' her to society so that she can oblige by luring a gigolo away from his wife. Uncanny coincidental parallels with La Règle du Jeu abound, and although the film echoes Renoir's bark more than his bite, it has a superbly malicious script by Brackett and Wilder, gorgeous sets and camerawork, and a matchless cast. All in all, probably Mitchell Leisen's best film.
Tom Milne

Here and above is the trailer. 

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