Irma la Douce (1963)

Truly the worst movie I've ever seen in a theater

The acting in this movie is really good.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

While Billy Wilder comedies rarely last more than two hours, Irma la Douce is abnormally long, 2h27, which induces a diluted narration, little dense action and a lack of rhythm unusual for the American director.The plot here horrendously drags on, some scenes are a lot too long and seem more like an excuse for Jack Lemmon's gestures — who, like the rest of the cast, is close to overacting — than to serve a real purpose story-wise.The last hour is particularly painful and it is with great relief that you get through this little inspired rom com, minor in Billy Wilder's filmography, and it's a bit infuriating because you can't help but think that with 30 to 45 minutes less, this could have been a great movie.

Billy Wilder made brilliant films like Sunset Boulevard(1950) and Double Indemnity(44)and memorable films like Ace in the Hole(51)and Stalag 17(53) as well as the classic comedy Some Like It Hot(59)but, the films he made in the 60s: Kiss Me, Stupid(64), One, Two, Three(61), The Fortune Cookie(66)and The Apartment(60) don't compare with his best, and Irma la Douce(63) is one of his worst. A single idea spread out over a charm free 147 minutes minus the songs from the Broadway musical it's based on. It's a pace-less, pointless, plot less, plodding...but why go on and on like the movie. It was an enormous BO hit in its day and MacLaine received an Oscar nomination, but for the life of me I can't imagine why, and Lemon is one-note in a role Peter Sellars would have been all to perfect for.

This film was written and directed by genius, Billy Wilder. This film is not one of his finest but it's worth watching with Jack Lemmon and Shirley Maclaine in it. Shirley plays the title role of a Parisian street walker with a poodle named Coquette who has kidney stones and drinks a little. Anyway, Lemmon's played Nestor, an honest policeman who raids the Hotel Casanova. While he thinks he will get a medal, his boss fires him for the raid. Anyway, the film is about prostitution in a light-hearted manner even in the 1960s. Irma invites Nestor to come and stay with her since he's jobless and homeless in her apartment. Anyway, Irma likes the color green and even wears green stockings. There is a lot of humor in this film if you watch all of it. Lou Jacobi is wonderful as the Mustache who helps Nestor land his dream girl.

Billy Wilder had an effective way of insinuating pathos into a comedy. It's always a temptation, I suppose, for writers and directors to do something "serious." Comedies are supposed to be all froth and no substance, while drama is to be paid attention to and applauded. But it's hard to blend the two. Woody Allan did it once or twice, as in "Annie Hall." Shakespeare's "dark comedies" weren't as successful as either his comedies or his tragedies -- that's in my opinion anyway, and I happen to be the world's leading expert on Walter Shakespeare.In Wilder's case he made some straight dramas ("Double Indemnity") and some exceptional straight comedies ("Some Like It Hot"). After 1960 he began to produce comedies with touches of sadness and they more or less worked. "The Apartment" was an example of this trend and so is "Irma La Douce." Jack Lemon is the ex cop who inadvertently becomes the pimp of Shirley MacLaine, the eponymous Irma, in Paris. They fall in love of course. She insists on supporting him in the finest fashion but he grows jealous because, after all, every passerby is banging the woman he loves. MacLaine, possessed of greater savoir-faire, is puzzled by Lemon's discomfort.So Lemon borrows 500 francs from his friend Mustache, dresses up as an English nobleman, and in this disguise arranges to meet his girl twice a week and pay her enough money, just for playing solitaire, that she can dispense with all her other clients. Lemon, dumb as an ox, beams with pride as he pulls this stunt off, until Mustache reminds him that although money is now changing hands, none will be coming in. He borrows from Mustache, the phony Englishman gives it to MacLaine, she gives it to Lemon, and Lemon gives it back to Mustache. So in order to keep this system an open one, Lemon begins to sneak out of the flat and work all night in the market, an unsustainable effort. Then it gets complicated. Lemon is arrested for his own murder.It all comes together and works, in a stage-bound and slightly old-fashioned way, rather like Wilder's later "The Front Page." The performances are very good indeed. MacLaine is matter-of-fact about her profession, very pretty, and sexy too, pale and slender. Lou Jacobi is Mustache and does fine with the role of the grandiose friend who teaches Lemon how to be "British." But Lemon is superb as the nervous and exhausted lover. Andre Previn's score is lively or wistful, as the circumstances demand, though it may depend on Borodin.It's pretty funny and you'll probably enjoy it.