Camarada X

Who would have guessed that the usually wooden but dazzlingly beautiful Hedy Lamarr could be so delightfully funny, adorable and charming as she is in this Ninotchka role. It's a pity that she was rarely --if ever again-- given another opportunity to play this sort of anything-goes screwball comedy. Hedy here is as real and believable as Carole Lombard at her best. The script written by Ben Hecht ("Nothing Sacred"), Charlie Lederer ("The Front Page" screenplay) and the uncredited Herman Mankiewicz ("Citizen Kane") is a bizarre hard-boiled political satire ending with a lengthy and totally absurd slapstick Russian tank chase through the woods and across the river into Rumania. It looks as if it came straight out of a Max Sennett movie. Gable is his usual tough and handsome self, wonderfully adept with the throw-away gags he is given. The rest of the cast is rounded out with some of the best European character actors then living in Hollywood --the Germans Sig Ruman, Felix Bressart and the Viennese Oskar Homoloka—- all playing Russians and Germans. As an added bonus there is the first on-screen appearance by the rarely seen Berlin-born actress, Natasha Lytess ("Olga"), best remembered now as Marilyn Monroe's first acting coach way before her Lee Strasberg days.

The film fascinates because it was made in 1940, just when WWII was getting started. Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia had just divided Poland between them and neither Nazis nor Communists much admired by most Americans. Our hero, played by Clark Gable, is forced by the Soviets to share his hotel room with a Nazi journalist. The Nazi is a caricature, as are the Soviets, who are shown ordering assassinations a¿of anyone they dislike. At one point the Gable character creates a diversion by shouting out that Germany has just invaded Russia. He is, of course, shouting a year too soon, but the reaction is interesting. The plot itself is foolish, but the glimpse into the past, with references to the Brooklyn Dodgers murdering the Reds (of Cincinatti) makes the movie great fun.

With the success MGM had with Ninotchka another lampooning of the Soviet Union seemed a natural. So the following year while the Hitler-Stalin pact was still active, MGM came up with Comrade X.

Comrade X is a pseudonym for some journalist who is sending uncensored stories out about the real Soviet Union. It happens to be Clark Gable and the whole Soviet secret police apparatus is after him.

But a valet at a hotel where the foreign correspondents stay played by Felix Bressart comes upon his secret. He offers a deal to Gable, he won't turn him in if Gable convinces Bressart's daughter Hedy Lamarr to leave the Soviet Union with him and come to America.

Easier said than done because Lamarr is as committed a Communist as Greta Garbo was in Ninotchka. So like Melvyn Douglas in Ninotchka, Gable's got his work cut out for him.

Comrade X's humor is a little more broad than Ninotchka's was. It even got a few good knocks in on Nazi Germany with Sig Ruman playing a German correspondent. The humor about the Soviets concerns what a dangerous thing it was to rise in the ranks of the party. Remember this was also the time of Stalin purging all kinds of people out of the party. Something that didn't stop until Hitler broke the non-aggression pact in 1941.

And Hedy Lamarr is sure no Garbo, but she acquits herself nicely in the role of the fuzzy headed idealist.

Gable, Lamarr, and Bressart get caught up in the internal politics of the Soviet Union and have to flee the country. What happens to them is the balance of the film and it is hilarious.

One of the best films done by both of the stars. Grand comedy.

Clark Gable and Hedy Lamarr star in "Comrade X," a 1940 comedy from MGM also starring Eve Arden, Felix Bressart and Oscar Homolka.

Gable and Arden are American journalists in Russia while the Russians search frantically for "Comrade X," a reporter sending out uncensored stories to the United States.

One man knows the identity of Comrade X - a bumbling valet in the hotel where many of the reporters stay (Felix Bressart). He fears his outspoken daughter is in danger of being purged by the Russians like so many and blackmails Comrade X into getting her out of the country.

Well, we've known from the beginning who Comrade X is - who else - and he reluctantly agrees to his assignment - reluctantly until he gets a look at the daughter (Lamarr), who is driving a streetcar using the name Theodore. Women can't drive streetcars.

Everyone is very good in this film, and Lamarr's staggering beauty and Gable's macho man are pluses. The supporting cast is great - Homolka is a government official who says his predecessor "met with an unfortunate accident" - as many of them do throughout the film.

I have to agree with one of the posters here - the scene with the tanks is absolutely priceless, particularly when you realize that films didn't have the mechanisms for "special effects" as they do today.

Lots of fun at the expense of good old Mother Russia.

Clark Gable was mostly known for his he-man; lady-killer roles but he did some excellent comedy and this movie is a little-known gem. There were some great lines, too. "Well, there's some good news and some bad news. Last week all the towels were stolen. But on the other hand the water wasn't running so nobody needed the towels. Everything balances." And "Communists have ideas, but they found out you can't run a government with everybody running around having ideas". That's actually pretty true, too! People in government with "ideas" are the bane of ANY country. Loved the scene at the cemetery where the funeral procession passes by a podium carrying a coffin on its shoulders and suddenly the "corpse" sticks his head & hand out of the coffin and takes a shot at a political enemy. Curiously, the movie predicts Germany declaring war on Russia. Which in fact happened shortly after the film came out.

Funny movie - the "Kaputski Cemetery"? Excellent!!!!