Love in the Afternoon (1957)

terrible... so disappointed.

Absolutely amazing

A different way of telling a story

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

For once, Billy Wilder strikes home concerning the music. Usually the music was the weak point in his films, his best films are those without any music, and sometimes his lack of musicality and terrible use of music, sometimes even degrading music itself, ruined the entire picture, like in "The Seven Year Itch" where he vulgarized Rachmaninov almost to prostitution. But here Franz Waxman saves the show and fills the whole picture with not only "Fascination" but with a number of other endearing evergreens as well. It has been pointed out in any number of reviews how Gary Cooper spoils the picture by being miscast, but it's worse than that. His whole character is a failure, and he isn't even convincing as such. Billy Wilder had a penchant for cheap vulgarizations, and here Gary Cooper is the means. They excuse him for being old and sick, he was 56 and Audrey 28, and he had only about 5 years left to live. Here he is an old pathetic playboy, spoiled beyond hope as a millionaire, and Maurice Chevalier is more right about his character than he is aware of. Also Maurice saves the show by turning serious for a change - and saving the situation. Audrey Hepburn, the script and the music save the picture most of all and turn it into perhaps Billy Wilder's most delightful comedy in spite of Gary Cooper's insufficiency. I saw it fifty years ago, but it was a greater pleasure to see it again - especially for the very outstanding music. After all, Audrey Hepburn is here a cellist.And not only Audrey and the music save the picture, but there is John McGiver as well. He would make another decisive appearance in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" as the jeweller, a minor supporting character but the most important spice for the whole film.

LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON is a sweetish and sophisticated romantic comedy. A young student of the cello, whose father works as a private detective, is seduced by an old womanizer. Their relationship is very romantic with a series of comic misunderstandings.Mr. Wilder made a humorous plot between love and morality. The story is simple. One seemingly naive young girl, who is full of adventurous spirit falls in love with the old, clumsy and insensitive womanizer. Dialogues are subtle. Love is presented as a game of cat and mouse. It is in the air, but can not figure out. An easy flirtation turns into a gentle farce. Emotions simply erupt, with strong sentimental moments, at the end of the film.Audrey Hepburn as Ariane Chavasse is a small Cinderella who can skillfully and mysteriously flirt. It is impossible to resist the beauty and tears in the eyes of Ms. Hepburn. Gary Cooper as Frank Flannagan is falsely awkward womanizer, who for the first time in his life shows emotions. Mr. Cooper, during the making of this film, was 56 years old. He looked too old and cumbersome for such exhibitions. Despite everything, the chemistry between the main protagonists is extremely high. Maurice Chevalier as Claude Chavasse is the "culprit" for love. Love matures at the end.

This film by Billy Wilder features beautiful B&W photography. Gary Cooper stars as a supposedly smooth womanizer (Frank Flannagan) who cares little for the women he beds. Audrey Hepburn plays a younger woman (Ariane Chavasse) who is intrigued by his intrigues and becomes personally involved.Shot in France, the film conveys a cosmopolitan air that almost sells the idea that these two might connect emotionally. But Cooper is not smooth enough to pull if off (no surprise) and the relationship between the two does not convince. It's not an issue of age; it's about chemistry and personality. Bogart in "Sabrina" offered the same problem, though less so. As an example of another pairing that worked well despite a sizable age difference, consider Stewart and Kelly in "Rear Window".Frankly, I'm surprised that such obviously poor pairings plague numerous films, but apparently some believe that box office draws can overcome such issues.

This charming movie has an utterly ridiculous premise and an ending as implausible as it is predictable, and yet it works quite well. In the film, Audrey Hepburn is a young woman who lives with her private- detective father and is fascinated by his sordid cases, finding the affairs and suicides wildly romantic. She becomes involved with a particularly notorious playboy, Gary Cooper.People object to Cooper/Hepburn's 30-year age difference, but I think the problem is more Cooper than the age difference. Director Wilder originally offered the part to Cary Grant, who was only 3 years younger than Cooper and who played opposite Hepburn quite successfully a few years later in Charade. I think people would have been far less bothered with Grant in the role, both because he was a better actor than Cooper, who had limited range, and because Cooper seems somewhat weak and ill; apparently he had health problems. Even then, I didn't find him as awful as some did; he still had a certain folksy charm, even when playing a cad.The story is not, I think, entirely unrealistic. Hepburn's character was full of a foolish romanticism and Cooper's character fascinated her before they even met. If you can accept that a woman would be intrigued by an inveterate player (and ultimately there are women who are attracted to Casanovas), then Hepburn's fascination and dissembling make perfect sense, at least when aided by Hepburn's beautifully tuned performance. Young beautiful women do sometimes fall in love with powerful, much older men, even if it seems nuts that they do.Throughout the movie, I was worried that I would be aggravated by the ending I expected, but while I got pretty much that ending, I thought it actually worked well. Somehow Wilder waded into the absurdity so slowly and smoothly, and Hepburn and Chevalier as her father were so dead on, that I could believe the whole, ridiculous thing. This is also a beautifully directed movie. While it's a very slight comedy, there is a lovely formal structuralism to it. It is a movie that is clearly by a talented director, yet not a movie that is trying to show off those talents. The scene with the liquor tables is beautiful but also practical and unshowy. Everything is like that; nothing is extraneous.There is a lot to object to in this movie, particularly the rather indulgent view the film takes toward Cooper's unsavory character and the utter silliness of the whole thing. Yet Hepburn's radiance, Wilder's brilliance, and an amusing script make the movie far more enjoyable than it has any right to be.