We open in New York, where the Smiths, Ann (Carole Lombard) and David (Robert Montgomery), have something of a tempestuous marriage. While they generally get along, they can have tiffs with each other that can last for several days. One day, Ann flat-out asks David if he'd marry her again, if they could do everything over. Much to her surprise, he says "no" - even though he loves her and wouldn't want to marry anyone else, he misses his independence. (Man, I can just picture this as an "Am I the Asshole?" submission on Reddit, and the "#$%& THIS GUY" rage tweets in response. I've spent too much time on the internet.) Naturally, this is the day that a county official from Indiana, where the Smiths got married, has arrived in town to let them know that thanks to a legal technicality, their marriage isn't legal. Ann expects David to propose again when they meet at their favorite restaurant, but when he doesn't, things get frosty, leading up to the couple's separation. This being a comedy, they naturally get back together in the end, but not before the requisite misunderstandings and mixups. (And no, they're not both secretly assassins - which is a shame, because that seems like a setup Hitchcock would have had a lot of fun with.)
I didn't think I'd be doing another Hitchcock film here on the INCspotlight, but his sole Hollywood attempt at comedy was too tempting to pass up. Mr. & Mrs. Smith was the brainchild of Norman Krasna (1909-1984), a playwright and screenwriter famed for his witty, snappy comedies, often involving mistaken identities. Although he originally planned on studying law, he abruptly switched his focus to journalism, snagging a gig as a copy boy, then as a theater critic for several New York papers. This was his springboard to working for Warner Bros.'s publicity department. He finally settled on playwrighting after seeing the movie adaptation of The Front Page (1931), based on a recent Broadway show. (To get used to playwrighting format, he got a hold of The Front Page's script and retyped the entire thing.) His first play was Louder, Please, which he tried to sell to Warner Bros., which they not only rejected, but it cost him his publicity job. However, Louder, Please made to to Broadway, and it got Krasna a gig with Columbia Pictures as a junior staff writer in 1932. Krasna remained with Columbia for two years, occasionally being loaned out to MGM and Universal, befriending Groucho Marx while at MGM. (Groucho and Krasna collaborated on the play Time For Elizabeth in 1948.) During a brief stint at RKO, his screenplay for The Richest Girl in the World (1934) earned him his first of four Academy Award nominations. From there he bounced around several different studios, eventually landing at RKO. It was here that Krasna came up with Mr. & Mrs. Smith, which he saw as an ideal vehicle for Carole Lombard. Lombard loved the idea and helped sell the idea to producer George Schaefer. Supposedly, Lombarde was also the one who convinced Alfred Hitchcock to direct this picture. Hitchcock had always wanted to work with Lombarde, although preferably in a serious role instead of a comedy. He claimed Lombarde had to persuade him to direct this one, and he'd agreed to do so as a favor. However, internal RKO memos indicate that Hitchcock actively wanted in on Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Even in a comedy, Hitchcock makes his requisite cameo. Given that this was Carole Lombarde's last film released before she was killed in a plane crash in 1942, I think some attention should be paid to her, before we dive into the movie itself. Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Jane Alice Peters was born into a wealthy family, and something of a tomboy growing up, passionate about both movies and atheltics. Director Allan Dwan happened to discover her while she was playing baseball with friends, and cast her in A Perfect Crime (1921). The film wasn't a huge success and hers wasn't a big part, but she loved the experience and wanted to continue with film acting. She auditioned rigorously, including for Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush (1925), finally landing a contract with the Fox Film Corporation, although she mostly played bit parts. She finally got a leading role in Marriage in Transit (1925), earning critical praise for her performance. Fox, however, was skeptical about her being leading lady material, and her contract wasn't renewed. Things finally turned around when she joined up with Mack Sennett, who specialized in comedies. This part of her career was both enjoyable and productive for Lombarde, who developed a knack for comedy that would serve her well later in her career. Pathé Exchange, which distributed Sennett's films, took notice of the fledgling actress and began giving her the meatier roles she craved. As she made her way from Pathé to Paramount, she continued to draw positive from critics, and the success of her films launched her to bigger and bigger roles. In 1934, she began her transition to screwball comedy, her claim to fame which would make her the highest-paid star in Hollywood by the end of the decade. Among her best-remembered movies from this era are Twentieth Century (1934), Hands Across the Table (1935), and My Man Godfrey (1936), which earned her an Academy Award nomination. Although she tried to transition to serious roles, these efforts were not well-received at the box office, and so she returned to comedy with Mr. and Mrs. Smith. My Man Godfrey (1936) WARNING: Here be spoilers! Read further at your own risk! We open in New York, where the Smiths, Ann (Carole Lombard) and David (Robert Montgomery), have something of a tempestuous marriage. While they generally get along, they can have tiffs with each other that can last for several days. One day, Ann flat-out asks David if he'd marry her again, if they could do everything over. Much to her surprise, he says "no" - even though he loves her and wouldn't want to marry anyone else, he misses his independence. (Man, I can just picture this as an "Am I the Asshole?" submission on Reddit, and the "#$%& THIS GUY" rage tweets in response. I've spent too much time on the internet.) Naturally, this is the day that a county official from Indiana, where the Smiths got married, has arrived in town to let them know that thanks to a legal technicality, their marriage isn't legal. Ann expects David to propose again when they meet at their favorite restaurant, but when he doesn't, things get frosty, leading up to the couple's separation. This being a comedy, they naturally get back together in the end, but not before the requisite misunderstandings and mixups. (And no, they're not both secretly assassins - which is a shame, because that seems like a setup Hitchcock would have had a lot of fun with.) For some reason, I was expecting this movie to be a lot more farcical than it was, given a perfect setup for a screwball comedy. Maybe part of the problem for me was the pairing of Carole Lombard and Robert Montgomery. Lombarde knocks it out of the park, not only in terms of the perfect comic timing of her line delivery, but the subtleties of her body language and facial reactions - just enough to sell the performance without ever going overboard. She effortlessly depicts spirit, sass, and vulnerability, making her a character you can naturally empathize with. Montgomery's portrayal of David Smith, on the other hand, is a little too callous, too restrained for a comedy, and he comes over as a jerk as a result. His role had originally been intended for Cary Grant, and it's a shame Grant's schedule didn't allow him to do this one. I think he would have done a better job of making David an easier character to laugh at instead of just dislike. As a result, even though the humor is there on the page, it doesn't land as well as it could have. Edward Ward's playful music score helps maintain the light, breezy tone, as if we need reminding that this is indeed meant to be a comedy. Then again, maybe Hitchcock is the one holding things back here, as if he's uncomfortable with the genre. He wasn't involved with the scripting process, like he usually was in his other films, and reportedly didn't really get the characters. As a result, he just employed a "point the camera and shoot" approach to this movie. It doesn't hurt the film any - a lighthearted screwball comedy doesn't really need any dramatic lighting or cinematography. There's a bit of a flourish where Ann and David are having breakfast together, Ann playfully rubbing David's legs with her feet. But when David tells her he wouldn't have married her if he had to do it all over again, we cut to her feet pulling away. Nothing else about the way this movie was shot stands out all that much, and it makes Mr. & Mrs. Smith unrecognizable as a Hitchcock film, other than his obligatory cameo. The shot in which he appears was directed by none other than Lombarde herself, who made him do a bunch of takes and found ways to troll him over his "actors are cattle" attitude. (Fun fact: this is supposedly the first movie to show a pizzeria on the big screen.) Hitchcock wasn't all that thrilled with Mr. & Mrs. Smith, which may explain his later accounts of how he had to be convinced by Carole Lombard to direct it. Audiences and critics at the time, however, felt differently. The film earned twice its budget at the box office, and snagged favorable reviews. As for me, for all my above criticisms, I did like this film, and it was interesting to watch - I always like seeing someone play against type, and a Hitchcock-directed comedy was definitely worth a watch. If you want to see it for yourselves, it's available through the Warner Archives, and it shows up on Turner Classic Movies every now and again. This isn't essential viewing, but it's definitely watchable thanks to Carole Lombarde's performance and a sharp script.
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