A Gentleman of Paris

There's nothing particularly wrong with this movie, I suppose. But if you've seen Charlie Chaplin's directorial debut, A Woman of Paris, which came out in 1923, four years before this movie, it makes A Gentleman of Paris look pretty pale in comparison.

In both cases, Adolph Menjou plays a Paris nobleman with an active libido who is about to marry but is not keen on abandoning his mistress - and, in this case, miscellaneous other girl friends - just because of that. Chaplin spent a lot of time developing the social milieu that could tolerate such immorality. This movie never examines the culture that produced Menjou's character.

Here, instead, the tension, to the extent that there is any, arises when the Marquis, without knowing it, has an affair with a woman who is actually the wife of his prized valet. (Why the valet would not have mentioned having a wife we never find out.) The valet wants to take revenge, and that motivates the second half of the movie. We don't really care, though, as we are never made to feel his pain. After all, the Baron had not known the woman was his wife, so....

There's nothing outstanding here. Menjou is much better playing basically the same character in Chaplin's movie, no doubt because he got better direction, and because the script/scenario was much more interesting.

This is the keynote role for Adolphe Menjou: he underplays the sophisticated clotheshorse, elegant, disdainful and a bit decadent, a role he played -- when he wasn't playing Runyonesque losers -- from 1917 through 1957's PATHS OF GLORY. In fact, Mr. Menjou was proudest of the fact that he usually made the best-dressed lists and it was as much his witch-hunting testimony before HUAC that caused a disintegrating film industry to decide they could find someone else to play his roles at better rates.

In this movie, Menjou is about to be married, and is advised by his prospective father-in-law to give up his euphemistic morning exercises and boxing kangaroos. He is prepared to do so, but when he and his valet discover that among his conquests is the valet's wife, all societal hell breaks amusingly loose.

It's a small thing, but it's noteworthy that unlike the great preponderance of the silent era, here the filmmakers quite declined any intertitles that serve to simply establish characters, settings, or the immediate scenario. I may be mistaken, but I counted exactly two intertitles that weren't relating dialogue. This seems important because even for someone like me who loves silent films and has watched many, the picture seems weak when it comes to initially identifying characters, or particularly giving order to the storytelling until a fair bit of the abbreviated runtime has already elapsed. On an unrelated note: owing to societal norms and censorial standards, we get such revisions as men and women "sleeping together" and having affairs but being depicted in separate beds. It's surprising that at the same time, 'A gentleman of Paris' was allowed to have intertitles that so heavily speak of affairs outside of marriage, or a story that allowed the philanderer to be written as our sympathetic protagonist, let alone to have the ending that he does. Maybe all this just means that filmmaker Harry d'Abbadie d'Arrast and/or the writing team were ahead of their time, trying something different, got lucky, or erred, or maybe the censors were lax on this for some reason. I'm not entirely sure what the answer is.

Either way, the most readily striking facets of this picture don't even speak directly to its quality. To that point, what next catches one's attention the most is the lovely costume design, hair, and makeup, especially for the women, and the splendid sets the crew built for the production. Would that any women in the cast were given meaningful roles and that this wasn't a vehicle chiefly for Adolphe Menjou and Nicholas Soussanin as the Marquis and Joseph, respectively; among the supporting cast, William B. Davidson and Lawrence Grant are far more prominent than any women involved. For what it's worth, I think everyone gives a fine performance of personality and nuance, perfect for the tale on hand of a serial womanizer, his trusted valet who enables and protects him from accountability, and the stumbling block that upsets that relationship. However, given how the Marquis is centered and written - as if we're supposed to feel sorry for him, not laugh at him - I don't think the intended notes of comedy ever had a chance of hitting like they ideally should; if this were built purely as a straight drama then the screenplay would have also needed distinct retooling to succeed. It's not that the tale at large isn't worthy, or that this isn't enjoyable in some measure, but 'A gentleman of Paris' is all over the place in terms of its tone, and in how its characters are written, and even at its best it's no more than passively amusing. The writers really needed to have discretely picked either comedy or drama, not a combination thereof, and fully committed thereto.

Some of the best movies ever made hail from the silent era, and even setting aside the exemplars, most silent movies at least deserve recognition, remembrance, and preservation as treasures of our culture. I won't go so far as to say that the latter is the only basis on which this 1927 title is deserving, but I sat to watch with no foreknowledge but fair expectations, and I'd be lying if I said I weren't a little disappointed. I don't think it's bad, but it's uneven and imbalanced, and the material as it presents is ill-suited for both comedy and drama, let alone a mix of the two; I'd quite like to see another treatment of Roy Horniman's novel and play that picked one side of the fence and stayed there - and that did the same for its characters - for that's what this needed most. I won't say "don't bother," but 'A gentleman of Paris' is far from a must-see, recommended only for those who are huge fans of the silent era, and suggested for a lazy day rather than a night set aside.

Le Marquis de Marignan is a French aristocrat and seducer who flirts with every Parisian girl he meets. If dallying with youngster fräuleins isn't enough to keep him busy, the Marquis also has to cope with an unexpected visit from his fiancée and her father. Not to mention that he is so incorrigible in his womanizing that he has even seduced his valet's wife ( a terrible mistake, this last one, because genuine aristocrats know very well that they can't meddle with the servants so if you must put your honour or your status at risk, it will be better if a rich and old heiress is involved.

Herr Harry d'Abbadie d'Arrast, director of the film "A Gentleman Of Paris", was an unknown film director who entered American films during the silent year of 1922 and then assisted Herr Chaplin on "A Woman Of Paris" (1923) and "The Gold Rush" (1925). This mysterious film director, born in Argentina, only directed a few films, eight films namely, including some talkies. "A Gentleman Of Paris" is an interesting and elegant comedy very influenced by Herr Monta Bell and especially Herr Ernst Lubitsch, who obviously Herr d'Arrast admired.

During the first half of the film, "A Gentleman Of Paris" is an exemplary and stylish comedy that uses the camera masterfully; a moving and subjective camera ( close-ups, zooms ) that discreetly gives subtle information or emphasizes the misunderstandings and foolish life of Le Marquis. It has many moments of remarkable high comedy and works perfectly thanks to Herr Adolphe Menjou who plays superbly Le Marquis, an ironic, cynical aristocrat fond of women, and one must not forget Herr Nicholas Soussanin who plays Joseph, the betrayed valet, one of those dutiful but perverse servants very hard to find nowadays.

Obviously Herr Lubitsch would have been more malicious, cynical and wicked with this story and he wouldn't digressed from a high comedy to a light comedy as Herr d'Arrast finally did at the end of the film, choosing the path of harmless sentimentality complete with a happy ending instead of continuing the confusion and the cynical attitude of Herr Le Marquis.

In spite of all, "A Gentleman Of Paris" is a good, even remarkable film for its technical aspects and solid performances of the entire cast although in the end it is much too conventional for Herr Lubitsch.

And now, if you'll allow me, I must temporarily take my leave because this German Count must make a Gentleman's agreement with le Marquis.

"A Gentleman of Paris" (1927) stars Adolphe Menjou in a rôle that somewhat defines the type of characters he would play in the following decades, a rather licentious, two-timing, incredibly suave and well-dressed, fastidious cad who the viewer tends to like anyway - - - up to a point - - - or more properly, puts up with. Here the Parisian dapper is engaged to a general's (Lawrence Grant) daughter (Shirley O'Hara), but is having several affairs, including one unwittingly with his valet's (Nicholas Soussanin) wife (Ivy Harris), whom Menjou didn't realize was married to his valet! Meanwhile, M. Henri Dufour (William B. Davidson) has come to a trysting place to have it out with Menjou over his (Dufour's) wife (Arlette Marchal), but during the confrontation is hoodwinked (and flummoxed) by Menjou's showing him that his (Dufour's) wife is not there (even though she IS, of course). A very funny scene. But...Menjou has to be caught sometime, oui? Well, maybe not. Yet something is in the cards...

I really enjoyed this until the end(ing)... I'm sorry for myself, but while I would have given this at least an 8/10, or even higher - had it ended with some common sense - OR SOME WIT!!! - it didn't. It was the Lubitsch touch that was missing. It ended, not quite like a Warner Brothers gangster picture, but like a Tiffany Production comedy might. I'll not tell the ending, but you won't like it. Just watch for all the reels before the ending. Menjou is marvelous in a 20s sophisticated European way put on by Americans. And, brother, could the man dress. His valet, Nicholas Soussanin, is quite the valet, too. But the man who finally gets a decent part - William B. Davidson - outdoes himself in this one. Too bad he isn't allowed to be at an ending where wit or some realistic judgement was the denouement, rather than an ending that looks like the money ran out and FINIS looked better than a wise-ass laugh.