My Life with Caroline

I had been led to believe for years that this was an inferior movie. It is a lesson to not take seriously reviews, professional or otherwise. This movie sparkles with glamour and wit. An all-star cast headed by the ever-charming Ronald Colman with strong performances by Anna Lee, Reginald Gardiner, Charles Winninger, and Gilbert Roland. The type of movie I'd like to see at least once a year.

... but I have started watching it about half a dozen times when it shows up on Turner Classic Movies, and this time I was determined to watch it to the end.

Caroline Mason (Anna Lee) is the wife of a successful publisher, Anthony Mason (Ronald Colman) whose work keeps him in New York. With lots of free time on her hands Caroline holidays in Idaho and Florida, and whenever she vacations, she seems to wind up in emotional affairs with men who have plenty of time on their hands to romance her, usually because they are independently wealthy, and the source of their wealth does not require their skill or attention. And both she and the other man in each case seem to be convinced they should be married.

Anthony shows up and, discovering these emotional affairs, is not angry or jealous. Instead, oddly enough, he is amused. He then goes about interfering with the affair in such a way that he hopes brings Caroline back to him, or at least keeps her with him. He loses or destroys notes she has written him asking for a divorce because both she and the other man are too cowardly to face him on it, he asks Caroline's pastor to call on her to ping her conscience, and he pops up or disrupts the would be couple's attempts at rendezvous. The question is why? Why does he want to act as roadrunner to her Wile E. Coyote? Just let this vacant woman go! In the words of Danny DeVito in War of the Roses - "There are other houses, there are other women!"

And that's where this movie breaks down. I don't believe any of the characters. Colman is charming as always, and that makes it doubly hard to figure out why he hangs on to the childlike, impulsive, and emotionally unfaithful Caroline. There are three characters that make this even a 5/10 - Colman of course, a butler who is a curious cross between Peter Lorre and Lurch from the Adams family, and a dog that continually bites and chases Caroline's father who aids and abets his daughter's affairs. Good for the dog!

This almost unknown gem was based on a French farce--which shows, and I mean that as a compliment.

Caroline (Lee) is being courted by a wealthy Argentinian (Roland), who asks her father for her hand in marriage. But Caroline is already married to Anthony (Colman), who has just arrived by plane and launches immediately into an audience-directed reminiscence about the last time Caroline decided she was in love with someone else: a dilettante-ish sculptor (Gardiner). The film plays out the story of Anthony's strategy in uncoupling Caroline from her sculptor, and how that experience aids him with her Argentinian.

It is perfectly cast: Ronald Colman is at his most sophisticated and charming, Reginald Gardiner is at his most priggish, Gilbert Roland is at his most exotic, and Anna Lee is just deliciously whimsical. The film is wonderfully directed by Lewis Milestone (who also produced); the whole production feels like a labor of love. There are wonderful touches, such as Colman breaking frame and addressing the camera, and exceptional use of a sliding bar-cabinet door. It is a sin that it hasn't been released on DVD--this is the kind of film that can singlehandedly awaken interest in classic film.

With a few exceptions (such as THE STORY OF MANKIND), Ronald Colman could have appeared in almost any film and made it worth watching. His smooth and apparently effortless performances made many mediocre films (such as this one) well worth seeing. As usual, he's THE reason to see this movie.

MY LIFE WITH CAROLINE has a pretty shallow and impossible to believe plot. His wife is an apparently brainless idiot (Anna Lee) and falls in love at the drop of a hat with other men who pay attention to her. He husband, Colman, is either completely cold and indifferent to her (leaving her alone for months at a time) or he is an ardent manipulator and suitor--a strange combination to say the least. None of this really makes sense and the characters seem....dumb. However, even though the plot is mindless, if you suspend belief you CAN find a fun and enjoyable film underneath it all. But, if you want your films to make sense or have some semblance of realism, then this one is best skipped.

My Life With Caroline had as its origins a play called The Parisian Life by Louis Verneuil and Georges Barr which did not do well on Broadway in its American debut. Still Ronald Colman and producer partner William Hawks saw something in it to make it the second of a two picture deal with RKO. The other film was Lucky Partners.

Colman was not happy with either film though he felt My Life With Caroline decidedly worse. If ever a film called for the Lubitsch touch My Life With Caroline is it. In his hands rather than Lewis Milestone's the film might have made it as a comedy.

The Citadel Film Series book The Films Of Ronald Colman says that leading lady Anna Lee acts a whole lot like Gracie Allen. If so than Colman has a George Burns moment at the beginning of the film. Gilbert Roland fresh from the Pampas has flipped for Lee and wants to take her back to Argentina, husband or not. Then Colman arrives on the scene and like Burns did regularly on his television show, Colman proceeds to break the fourth wall and tell Roland will not be the first or last to fall for wife Caroline, the girl just can't help it and Colman can't help but to put up with it. And as illustration Colman tells us about her last little flirtation with Reginald Gardiner and how that all ended up.

The debonair Ronald Colman is up to the task of carrying My Life With Caroline and he does bear the burden admirably. The problem is comedy should not be a burden.