A group of disparate travelers are caught and thrown together in a posh Alpine hotel when the borders are closed at the beginning of World War II.A group of disparate travelers are caught and thrown together in a posh Alpine hotel when the borders are closed at the beginning of World War II.A group of disparate travelers are caught and thrown together in a posh Alpine hotel when the borders are closed at the beginning of World War II.
- Donald Navadel
- (as Skeets Gallagher)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThis was the only film in which Clark Gable performed a dance number. He spent 6 weeks rehearsing the steps with the dance director, George King, and practicing at home with his wife, Carole Lombard. Because of his fear of messing it up during a take, the set was closed during the filming of this sequence.
- GoofsIn the middle of the "Puttin' on the Ritz" performance, the Les Blondes dancer second from the viewer's left is barely in step and not doing any arm movements because she is holding her costume's right-shoulder strap which has broken. The strap is no longer broken when it cuts back to the performers after a reaction shot of Irene (Norma Shearer).
- Quotes
Irene: Did I ever tell you of my escape from the Soviets?
Achille Weber: You've told me about it at least eleven times, and every time it was different.
Irene: Well, I made several escapes. I am always making escapes, Achille. When I worry about you and your career, I have to run away from the terror of my own thoughts. So I amuse myself by studying the faces of the people I see. Just ordinary, casual, dull people. That little English couple for instance - I was watching them during dinner, sitting there close together, holding hands. And I saw him in his nice, smart British uniform shooting a little pistol at a huge tank. And the tank rolls over him. And his fine, strong body that was so full of the capacity for ecstasy... is a mass of mashed flesh and bones. A smear of purple blood, like a stepped-on snail. But before the moment of death, he consoles himself by thinking, "thank God she is safe. She is bearing the child I gave her. And he will live to see a better world." But I know where she is. She is under a house that has been racked by an air raid. She is as dead as he is. But he, he died in action against the enemy gloriously. But she died in a cellar, not so very gloriously. There will be many who will die this way in this war, won't there Achille?
[he does not respond]
Irene: You don't say anything! Probably you are bored. But I like to think about these things, Achille. And it makes me so proud to think that I am so close to you, who makes all this possible.
Achille Weber: That's all very interesting, my dear. But before you waste too much sympathy on these little people like your English friends, just ask yourself this: why shouldn't they die? And who are the greater criminals - those who sell the instruments of death or those who buy them and use them? It is they who make war seem noble and heroic, and what does it all amount to? Mistrust of the motives of everyone else! A dog-in-the-manger defence of all they've got, greed for the other fellow's possessions! Oh, I assure you, Irene, for such little people, the deadliest weapons are the most merciful.
- Crazy creditsThe six actresses who play Les Blondes are not credited with individual character names. Instead, they are credited using the group character name "Harry Van's Les Blondes" followed by a list of the six actresses names. This appears on a separate title card after the cast list of the other credited roles.
- Alternate versionsMGM filmed two endings for this film: one for American audiences and another, more spiritual and optimistic ending for International audiences because of the war clouds that were gathering in Europe.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Big Parade of Hits for 1940 (1940)
Not having seen the play, it's a little unclear as to what "Idiot's Delight" was supposed to be - a comedy? A drama? A farce? A vaudevillian and his troop wind up having to stay at an Alpine hotel due to border closing as World War II is about to begin. There he meets a woman he swears he has already met - the exotic Irene, a blond Russian, who is traveling with an arms manufacturer (Edward Arnold). Some years before, Gable met this woman, he believes, when she had a different color hair and no accent.
Other people at the hotel are a doctor (Coburn), a pacifist (Meredith), honeymooners (Peter Willes and Pat Paterson) and an Italian officer (Joseph Schildkraut). War does break out, the borders re-open quickly - but Harry wants an answer to his question - is Irene the same woman?
This film possibly was intended to be a high-class version of "The Petrified Forest" with people of different beliefs all stuck in the same place, but with Gable dancing and Shearer doing an imitation of Garbo, the balance is thrown off a bit. Nevertheless, despite some comments on this board, they're both very funny.
Someone suggested Gene Kelly, had he been around, would have been good as the vaudevillian, missing the point that Harry isn't particularly talented, he's just glib. No one would have seriously cast Clark Gable as a musical comedy performer unless it was intended he be bad. Shearer goes all out as a black-gowned, platinum blond Russian holding a cigarette in a long holder. As Gable tries to pierce her identity, she regales him with wild stories.
So we have Gable dancing and Shearer speaking with a Russian accent on one side, and Burgess Meredith on the other, screaming his guts out about the coming war. In the middle is the medical scientist played by Coburn and the cold manufacturer of Edward Arnold, who doesn't seem to care if Irene has passport problems or not.
TCM showed two endings of this film - one for Europe and one for the U.S., the U.S. one totally ignoring the war. Watching both was fascinating.
Despite the comedy, the film has very serious undertones, but I wonder if they didn't get somewhat lost due to the power of the two stars. They both give first-rate performances, but one wonders if they were doing the same movie as Meredith et al. Nevertheless, well worth seeing.
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Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Languages
- Also known as
- Idiotovo zadovoljstvo
- Filming locations
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $1,519,000 (estimated)
- Runtime1 hour 47 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1