Boeing, Boeing

1965's "Boeing Boeing" is a dated but mildly amusing film starring Tony Curtis, Thelma Ritter, Jerry Lewis and Dany Saval. Curtis is a swinging bachelor living in Paris who is juggling three flight attendants at one time, all of whom live with him, and all of them are his fiancees.

He's able to do this with the help of his able housekeeper (Ritter) and his carefully worked-out airline schedules. Unfortunately, the new fast planes are goofing up the schedules. Adding to the confusion is a visit by his friend Robert (Lewis), a reporter. The two men and an exhausted Ritter try to keep the women from running into one another at the apartment as their arrivals overlap.

"Boeing Boeing" was originally a play that had a very brief run on Broadway in the 1960's and went on to become the mainstay of dinner theaters throughout the U. S. After a very successful run in London, it has recently been revived on Broadway starring Christine Baranski as the maid, Bradley Whitford in the Tony Curtis role, Gina Gershon as an Italian flight attendant and Maureen McCormack as a German one.

Not having seen the original play, it's hard to know what if anything in the film was changed from the play. In the current Broadway production, the Jerry Lewis character, done to great acclaim on both continents by Mark Rylance, is totally different - he's a shlub who's never seen a woman before. Lewis would have been perfect playing it that way - instead, in the film, the character of Robert is very against type, quite serious.

The handsome Curtis does comedy well and is a perfect playboy. Baranski currently does the Ritter role with a French accent, which wrecks most of the dry humor that Baranski, like Ritter, brings to a role. Ritter is very funny as she changes the photograph on the desk, cooks sauerkraut for the German flight attendant, tosses it when the French flight attendant arrives and makes a soufflé instead and basically wears herself out.

"Boeing Boeing" is pleasant and fun to watch as an example of that great comedy form, the farce.

In this 1965 Paramount Pictures comedy, Tony Curtis and Jerry Lewis are nutty and, for all practical purposes, perpetual kids. The setting is Paris where Bernard Lewis (played by Curtis) is definitely a philanderer who never wants to marry but have only fiancees, and he has three who are all airline stewardesses; there is the beautiful actress Christiane Schmitdner who plays a stewardess for Lufthansa, Davy Saval plays a stewardess for Air France, and Suzanna Leigh plays a stewardess for British Airways. Robert Reed, played by Lewis, is a newspaper man assigned to Paris where he stays with his friend of many years Bernard. During his time there, against his wishes Bernard's fiancees end up arriving at his apartment at the same time due to sudden changes in flight schedules, but one doesn't know the others are there. It does become silly and comical when the two men are hiding each girl in a separate bedroom, sometimes moving them around fast, and coming up with weak last-minute excuses as to why each one of them cannot stay where she has been resting. Thelma Ritter is quite comical as the maid who gets caught in the middle of the entire zany situation. The Paris sights are beautiful and, again, despite the bizarre story line, it is hard not to laugh at the nutty piece

When the opening credits run, and the supporting female cast members ‘measurements' are shown beneath their names, you have no doubt you're in the 60's, bedroom farce, defined. In a role reversal of sorts Jerry Lewis plays straight man to Tony Curtis this time around .

Bernie Lawrence (Curtis) is an American newspaper man stationed in Paris, the man for whom there is never too many airline hostesses, just too little time. His delicately balanced, and timed to the minute, 4-way love life comes totally unwound when old pal Robert Reed (Lewis) arrives for an unexpected stay.

Cliché after cliché, time stamped in most every shot, Boeing Boeing is a tribute to a different type of filmmaking than we see today, a different morality, a different approach to comedy.

Wonderful Paris sights are an added treat. Recommended.

"Boeing, Boeing" is a very unusual film for the time because although Jerry Lewis is one of the stars of the picture, he neither directed nor wrote it. He's simply there as an actor and isn't quite the same goofy guy he is in his other films. In fact, in some ways he's quite a jerk...a definite departure.

The story is about a super-selfish guy. Bernard (Tony Curtis) is a major womanizer. He's arranged his life in Paris so that he's engaged to three different stewardesses at the same time. It works out because each thinks she's his only woman and because their schedules work out so, they are oblivious to his machinations. However, two things upset his plans...the arrival of Robert (Lewis) and the women's schedules...which suddenly start getting discombobulated. So for most of the film, Bernard works tirelessly to hide each woman from the others...sometimes with Robert's help and sometimes Robert seems to be out for just himself.

This American-made bedroom farce suffers because Bernard and Robert are jerks...and two of the three fiancees seem pretty nasty. The third fiancé is just kind of dumb. Because of all this, the film doesn't work as well as it could and it's obvious that the director and stars try to make up for a somewhat weak plot by putting TONS of energy into their performances. It's not unpleasant but can understand why this isn't one of Lewis' or Curtis' more famous efforts.

You'll enjoy this movie from start to end if you take it as it is: a fun, entertaining film with two wonderful leading men. Tony Curtis was a brilliant actor, and in comedies he's simply amazing. I spent a wonderful evening laughing out loud in certain moments. See it!