History Is Made at Night (1937)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Absolutely Brilliant!

A Masterpiece!

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

This is an uncomfortable love story with more baggage attached than most others. It starts off like a melodrama with a murder and an attempted rape scene, and has as its pivotal character an obsessive neurotic millionaire. The heroine wants a divorce from him but he resists, and apparently will go to any lengths to prevent her from leaving him.Into this nasty prologue stumbles Charles Boyer, who saves the lady from a frameup and is embroiled in her circumstance by falling love with her. The story contains more tension and downbeat episodes than most romances and I felt this made for an unpleasant movie. There was good chemistry between Boyer and Jean Arthur, and the screen fairly glows when they are on screen together.Colin Clive, as her husband, was too good in his part and overwhelmed Arthur and Boyer by the sheer force and intensity of his characterization. I felt the picture would have been better off with a softer actor whose presence was not so keenly felt when he was not on screen. He hung over their scenes like an impending volcano. Couple this with an unbelievable finale, and I was left searching for a suitable rating for a picture which works as a romance but not as a representation of reality.

I liked parts of this movie a lot.But when the ship hits an iceberg near the end and suddenly we are redoing one of the many Titanic movies, I found myself saying: "Did someone change the channel on me without telling me?" I don't expect movies to fit into neat little genre boxes, and I don't want to know what's going to happen an hour before it happens, but when the genre is changed, radically, with no preparation, there is a problem, at least for me. I very much felt that I was being played with by a director who couldn't figure out what to do with what becomes an ever more cumbersome situation. The ship hitting the iceberg was NOT a seamless, convincing way to handle that, despite what some others on here have said.And Colin Clive seems to be in a different movie from the beginning. His acting style just does not integrate with that of the other actors. We keep going back and forth between a 1930s romantic comedy with Arthur and Boyer and a 1920s melodrama with Arthur and Clive.Yes, the scenes between Jean Arthur and Charles Boyer are very romantic in a general sense. There is a lot of good chemistry between the two of them.But the script is so weak, and could have been so much better. For example: early on in the movie, when Boyer, pretending to be a burglar, kidnaps Arthur to save her from a compromising situation set up by her husband, Arthur's character shows little or no surprise, much less fear, fear that would have been normal in such a situation. If she had expressed such fear, the subsequent scene in the cab, when Boyer explains he is not really a burglar but just wanted to save her from a compromising set up, could have been much more interesting. Arthur's character could have been a lot more interesting if the script writers had just given her something decent to work with.I really can't recommend this movie. There are nice scenes, but the framework just doesn't hold up.

Two years before a shipboard romance with Irene Dunne in "Love Affair", suave Frenchman Charles Boyer did the same with Jean Arthur in this lavish and sometimes comic tearjerker. Arthur is a run-away bride who spends one glorious evening with Boyer after he rescues her from a plot by her evil husband (Colin Clive). Later separated from Boyer, Arthur ends up in New York where fate brings them together and onto a return voyage to France that will change the course of their destiny.This might not be the classic love story of Leo McCarey's 1939 masterpiece and its 1957 remake "An Affair to Remember", but it is worthy of inclusion with the greatest love stories ever made. Any film with Boyer and Arthur will include dollops of humor here and there, and it helps the film avoid being mawkish and melodramatic. Colin Clive is a predictable villain, much like Billy Zane years later in "Titanic". References to that ship and the Hindenburgh are mentioned. Some good special effects are involved in the film's chilling conclusion.The film has many implausibilities, but that has really no consequence because of the ultimate satisfaction it gives. Leo Carrillo shines as Boyer's pal, a cook who can do the most wonderful thing with lobster. That would be a great dinner to serve while watching this movie, with pink champagne of course!

The obsessive and jealous shipowner Bruce Vail (Colin Clive) does not accept the divorce his wife Irene Vail (Jean Arthur) achieved in London, and he hires his driver Michael Browsky (Ivan Lebedeff) to forge adultery with Irene in Paris to make the decree null. However, she is rescued by the headwaiter Paul Dumond (Charles Boyer), who punches Michael and locks Bruce and his private eyes in a locker, and they spend a wonderful night together in the restaurant Château Bleu, where Paul and his best friend Chef Cesare (Leo Carrillo) work, and they fall in love for each other. Meanwhile, Bruce kills Michael and blackmails Irene, blaming Paul and forcing her to return with him to New York. But Paul does not give up on Irene, and moves to New York with Cesare trying to find her love. They meet each other, but things get complicated when an innocent is arrested accused of murdering the driver."History is Made at Night" is a dated melodrama, but extremely romantic. Jean Arthur and Charles Boyer show an amazing chemistry in this delightful romance. The friendship of Cesare and Paul is quite unbelievable in the present days, but gives the funniest moments in this film. Colin Clive performs an obsessive and totally insane villain, with his sick jealousy. But in the end, love wins for the pleasure of the romantic viewers. My vote is eight.Title (Brazil): "A História Começou A Noite" ("The History Has Begun at Night")Note: On 05 March 2012 I saw this film again.