Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Tayloriona Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Raymond Sierra The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

bigverybadtom The title characters are a bickering couple who had been married for three years-or so they had thought. A lawyer tells them about a legal technicality that made their marriage invalid after all. So do they go ahead and marry for real this time?Unfortunately wifey has second thoughts, and the movie has her pursuing other men, despite all the trouble Mr. Smith goes through to get her to take him back. Will he eventually succeed?The movie is amusing, but never builds up any tension or big laughs. Screwball farces were in vogue in the era, but Alfred Hitchcock probably was not comfortable with this material, and the leads do very well, the side characters are weaker. Still entertaining if you don't expect a great classic.

SimonJack "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" is a good comedy about a couple who learn that they haven't been legally married the past three years as they thought they were. The "un-marriage" is based on an absurd notion, but it sets the stage for what follows. And what follows is a comedy of errors and airs in which the groom pursues his bride all over again, while she plays hard to get.Robert Montgomery and Carole Lombard are the leads as David and Ann Smith. She reverts to her maiden name, Ann Krausheimer when they split up. This isn't one of Carole Lombard's funnier roles, but Montgomery is funny as he jumps through hoops to try to win his wife back. His law firm partner, Jeff Custer, also wants to woo Ann. Gene Raymond plays his part superbly as a real male wallflower. He's straight faced, overly considerate, and straightforward about a relationship with the one-time wife of his best friend and partner. It makes it that much funnier – and frustrating for David.Some of the funniest scenes are with Jeff's parents. Lucille Watson plays Mrs. Custer, Jeff's mother. She was one of the consummate Hollywood supporting cast who played superbly the role of a shocked mother, or mother-in-law, or snobbish, Puritanical society dame. Philip Merivale is equally aghast as Jeff's father, Ashley Custer. An uproarious scene occurs when Jeff introduces them to Ann. Just as they think she is a sweet, young thing, David enters the office and talks about their coffee together over the morning breakfast table the past three years. The crunch comes when he asks about his laundry, and says he doesn't have any more clean shorts. A type of this scene replays toward the end of the film – with hilarious portrayals of the dumbfounded and astonished Custers.It's a good thing that David and Jeff owned their own law firm. No one else would have been able to take so much time away from work as David did to pursue Ann. Some reviewers are surprised that this film was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Hitch was well established as a versatile director before he came to the U.S. just before the start of World War II. He became known for his mastery at mystery films. But he had done a number of comedies, romances and dramas before, and even did one successful musical drama.This film came out at the end of January 1941. A year later Carole Lombard would be dead. She was killed in a plane crash in Nevada while returning home to California from a war bond drive. She was only 34 years old, but she is remembered today from some of the wonderful films she was in, especially her comedy roles. She was in 80 films in a 16-year career.On the other hand, Robert Montgomery isn't as well known today. He played a variety of roles in more than 60 films, but ended his silver screen career at age 46 in 1950. He spent the rest of his career in television. His last acting was in 1950-51 in his long-running TV series, Robert Montgomery Presents. After that, he continued to produce that show until 1957 and did some more TV production until 1960. He continued to work in the theater in the 1950s and won the 1955 Tony Award as best director for "The Desperate Hours." In 1968, Montgomery wrote a book entitled "An Open Letter from a Television Viewer" in which he lambasted the TV industry for its programming of violence.A favorite scene of mine in "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" has Jeff and Ann riding in a sleigh to the cottages they have booked at Lake Placid in the Adirondacks. Ann says, "I love the smell of snow." Jeff says, "No one can smell snow." And Ann responds, "I can." Jeff looks around as though he's sniffing, then looks down at the horses pulling the sleigh and says, "That isn't snow."

jc-osms Despite some neat touches, this Carole Lombard feature proves that Alfred Hitchcock was right to stay in the suspense thriller rather than screwball comedy genre. Not that some of his best films don't feature some arch humour (think "The 39 Steps" or "The Lady Vanishes" but a Hitchcock film devoid of thrills is like a bird without wings, in other words it won't fly.The storyline is typical of its type, a married couple learn that by a fluke they aren't actually married and before you know it are frantically competing to make the other jealous, Lombard even threatening to marry "husband" Montgomery's best pal and business partner, played by Gene Raymond, before it all unsurprisingly resolves itself happily ever after for the would-be warring couple. There are some likable things in the movie, the nice use of locations such as a pizzeria, funfair and snow lodge, some typically coarse directorial humour over the dining table, Miss Lombard's effervescent performance and some minor directorial flourishes from Hitchcock, like the on-high shot on the fun-fair's big-wheel ride or the last scene when Lombard surrenders back to Montgomery, oddly prescient of Grace Kelly's murder scene in the years later "Dial M For Murder", but on the whole the movie lacks sparkle or even a spark.Montgomery just moons about and Raymond's character for all he's trying to steal his best friend's girl is very bland,a mummy and daddy's boy, leaving Lombard to try to carry the movie on her own, but it's beyond both her and Hitchcock's talents and more or less plods along to its predicable conclusion.As a Hitchcock fan, I was intrigued to see a film of his I'd not seen before, but in truth, there was little to identify it as one by the Master and it's not one I'll be returning to anytime soon.

ShootingShark David and Ann Smith live in New York and have a tempestuous but loving marriage. When the registrar of the remote county they were married in reveals to David that their union is not technically legal, he must decide whether he wants to marry Ann again ...This RKO screwball comedy is an interesting curio in Hitchcock's back catalogue if only because it's probably his one out-and-out comedy. Almost all of his films contain humour and some (like The Trouble With Harry) are overtly comic, but they all retain macabre or thriller elements. This on the other hand is in the classic style of the time - you can almost see Hepburn and Tracy in the roles - and as such it seems a little contrived in Hitchcock's hands. It's a lot of fun though, with good dialogue, and fine performances from all three leads; Montgomery (the father of Bewitched TV star Elizabeth) is agreeably resigned to his life's complications, Lombard is terrific as always as the needy, sulky, over-analysing shrew, and Raymond is wonderfully patient and strait-laced as the third point of an extremely grating love triangle. There are plenty of funny moments to keep it going, like the dialogue about the cat or the scene in the bathroom with the noisy plumbing, but it doesn't have the tension or objective sweep we are accustomed to with Hitch's films. All in all, a pleasant flick to catch on a slow evening but not the kind of movie we'd expect from the master of suspense. Written by Norman Krasna and not to be confused with the unrelated 2005 Angelina Jolie / Brad Pitt thriller with the same name.