A Scandal in Paris (1946)

From the title, I suspect the movie was marketed as a peek at those notoriously naughty French and their customs. After all, the year is 1946 and the coldly restrictive Production Code is in force in Hollywood. So audiences have to find titillation where they can and producers have to work in risqué spots as best they can. Here, the apparently nude swim (which really isn't), along with the occasionally revealing and shapely Carol Landis, does provide some visual stimulation. However, it's the script that provides the main innuendo, as other reviewers point out. The trouble is that much of that innuendo is pretty sophisticated and flies by too quickly to be savored. Seems to me, the script may have misjudged the distance between the European movie makers and thrill-seeking American audiences. All in all, I'd be curious to know how the average viewer of the day responded to this exercise in continental style and wit.To me, the movie never really gels. On one dramatic end is Sanders playing it pretty straight, while on the other, is Lockhart clowning it up as a police official, no less. And in between are various shades of seriousness and tongue-in-cheek, such that the movie fails to establish a defining mood. Then too, the severity of the showdown at film's end strikes me as badly out of sync with the lighter parts. Add to that thinly disguised cardboard sets, an unusually dour ingénue (Signe Hasso), and the result is a kind of mish-mash that only occasionally works. Too bad the utterly charming whimsy of the final 30 seconds is not replicated by the feature itself. Still and all, no movie that sticks witty aphorisms onto the sardonic tongue of the incomparable George Sanders can be ignored.

"A Scandal in Paris" is a 1946 film starring George Sanders, Akim Tamiroff, Signe Hasso, and Carole Landis. Directed by Douglas Sirk, it's based on the memoirs of François-Eugène Vidocq, a thief who became the Chief of Police in the 18th Century. The story begins with Francois being born in a jail and covers his European escapades. At one point, he poses for a painting of St. George and rides off on the horse he sits on; later, a marquise's granddaughter (Hasso) falls in love with the face in the painting and recognizes him when he comes to stay with her grandmother...and steal her jewels.A very witty script that is perfect for the elegant, handsome Sanders. This role seems tailor-made for him. The beautiful Carole Landis plays one of his victims, a showgirl with a valuable garter. Sadly, by this time, her career had really stalled out. She's still a bright and glamorous presence. Hasso is an odd choice for an ingénue role, though she does a good job.Entertaining film, particularly because of George Sanders.

There. That's the gist of it. Though the script is really quite good, the picture doesn't quite come off. Sanders is perhaps too much himself here to be very interesting -- his "ennuyeux" style seems just a little TOO little, here -- which creates something of a hole at the center. On the other hand, the supporting cast, with one exception (see below) is superb. First, Akim Tamiroff at 46 in a superb makeup that makes him look not a day over 25 -- he's Sanders's comic sidekick, who, in the last reel turns surprisingly (but satisfyingly) into his nemesis. It's an amazingly detailed performance, constantly interesting -- and really quite out of his usual line. Signe Hasso is lovely in quite a small role (considering her billing), and Gene Lockhart, Alan Napier, Alma Kruger, Vladimir Sokoloff, and, really, all the supporting cast (including, if I'm not mistaken, an unbilled -- and unaccented! -- Julius Tannen as the President of the Bank of France) are excellent and amusing. The child actress Jo Ann Williams (Kay Pierce of "Mildred Pierce" as well, and the child version of Hedy Lamarr in "The Strange Woman") is excellent, on a par with Margaret O'Brien, even. Superb art direction, too. Unfortunately, two elements, imho, are little short of disastrous. First, and most sadly, perhaps, is that Carole Landis is barely adequate in what is the more important of the two female star roles. Unnatural, stagy -- almost amateurish. (Incidentally, she bears a striking resemblance to Dolores Gray.) Finally, and also sad to say, Hanns Eisler's score, though filled with interesting music, is really not right. (In Jon Halliday's interview with Sirk, Sirk reveals that Eisler was not happy with the score -- and even wanted to re-do it completely, but there was no time.) There's just too much of it, and at times (especially in the scenes at the carousel -- one of which is crucial) rather heavy-handedly makes the wrong points. (To clarify, the carousel is identified with a kind of musical chinoiserie. Fine, a little heavy-handed, but all right. When Vidocq catches up with "the dragon" in a final showdown, it happens on the carousel. What do we hear? "Chinese" music. It doesn't work.) Of course this has been for long one of the Sirk rarities. Pace an earlier commentator, this is by no means Sirk at his low point (I nominate "Slightly French," followed closely by "No Room for the Groom" and "Mystery Submarine"); rather in search of a workable style for America. ("Summer Storm" and "Lured" -- Sirk's other "European" films of the forties -- are both much more successful.)

I was already a fan of George Sanders - but this film really gives him the witty language that he can spin under his breath better than any actor in movies. The story itself is far more interesting in its twists and turns than expected. Listen carefully - and you hear real style and imagination.