"The Last Time I Saw Paris" was a hit in 1954-55, mostly because of the rising super star, Elizabeth Taylor. Taylor was the lead female, Helen Ellswirth, but her role and part in the story were second to the male lead, Charles Wills, played by Van Johnson. The fact that the 22-year-old Taylor was billed ahead of Johnson shows her star status and MGM's promo to cash in on the movie.
While it was a success at the box office - bringing in just under $5 million on a budget just under $2 million, the film finished 36th for the year. Considering its star content that included Walter Pidgeon, Donna Reed, Eva Gabor, and the rising Roger Moore, "The Last Time I Saw Paris" might have finished much better. There were many good movies in 1954, the year that "White Christmas" topped them all at the box office, and got just one Academy Award nomination. It was also the year of "Rear Window," "The Caine Mutiny," "The Glenn Miller Story," "On the Waterfront," "Magnificent Obsession," and a host of musicals, comedy romances, dramas, Westerns and war films that all fared better than this film.
Other reviewers have noted the characteristic of this film that sets it back. It's heavy melodrama, fodder for the daytime TV soap operas that were airing at the time. It's slow and drawn out. And, the fact that the main cast are almost all dysfunctional characters, puts a moribund pall over the film. It even starts off that way. So, the gaiety and excitement of the main period in the life of Charles Wills (Van Johnson) and Helen Ellswirth (Elizabeth Taylor) don't come off as fun at all. More pall descends on the film.
Walter Pidgeon's James Ellswirth interjects some light comedy in his hedonistic, irresponsible character. A young Roger Moore has the role of a tennis bum gigolo, Paul. And the capable Donna Reed is seen mostly as a sour, snippy woman with a huge secret that she can't hide from her husband, Claude Matine (George Dolenz), or the audience.
Van Johnson's role is strange, and one can't imagine why Helen would fall for him. Except for a little smiling and openness early, his character becomes moribund through most of the film. There are no exceptional or even very good portrayals in the film - perhaps Taylor's is the best as just okay.
I think this film had possibility, but the writers would need to put some life and spunk into Johnson's Wills. His self-pity wears very thin very fast; then his alcoholism and the very strange marital relationship of the two weighs down this film.
I strain to give the film five stars, so that's a credit as much to the decent but minor portrayal by Pidgeon. As the totally irresponsible head of the Ellswirth family, his witty philosophy at times provides the only spark for this film.
Here are the best lines of this movie, set in Paris just after the end of World War II.
James Ellswirth, "Your sister has made me very proud. We couldn't tell you the good news before, but Helen has been expelled from the university."
James Ellsworth, "Oh, now look, let her alone. After all, I was expelled from Harvard once, and why shouldn't a girl follow in her father's footsteps?"
Helen Ellswirth, "We're not rich either. We just live that way. Daddy says it the same thing, only it's much cheaper."
Helen Ellswirth, "Daddy says, it isn't what you have, it's what you owe."
James Ellswirth, "Helen getting married. Marion getting married. Father abandoned in middle age." Exhales, "Hmph. What man could ask for more?"
Charles Wills, "Is it Sunday already? What happened to Friday and Saturday?"
Charles Wills: "What'd I do?" Helen Ellswirth, "That, I'd be very interested to know."
Charles Wills: "Well, where are you going?" Helen, "To do something important - buy a new hat."
