The Lady Says No (1952)

You're going to need some serious suspension of disbelief to watch this one. I mean, who would say "no" to David Niven? Joan Caufield plays a best-selling authoress, whose claim to fame is a book that warns unsuspecting women about the greatest horror known as Man. Men are filthy, nasty beasts, and women would do well to always say "no"! David Niven works for a popular magazine, and he's assigned to do a featurette on Joan. He hates her book and her message, and as soon as they meet, they're at each other's throats-and not in a good way. But, since it is David Niven, she just might be charmed long enough to listen to what he has to say.Yes, it's pretty silly, and enormously dated, but if you like silly and dated, you won't go wrong by renting The Lady Says No on a rainy afternoon. David Niven is absolutely adorable and charming, and since I love him anyway, it's easy to root for him in this funny 50s romp. My advice: watch the opening credits. If you start laughing during the song, you're in the right mindset to enjoy the rest of the movie. I find it hilarious.

As another reviewer once noted, "The Lady Says No" is "a listless raspberry at feminism circa 1951." This is a good description as far as it goes. The film is uninspired and quite predictable. Pretty Joan Caulfield plays feminist author Dorinda Hatch who has written a book advising women to avoid romances with men. Handsome David Niven plays wolfish Bill Shelby who is attracted to this man-hater and soon has her reluctantly returning his desires. The film has a lackluster script. Caulfield does the best she can with the part but Niven appears just plain bored as if he has mentally checked out from this trite material.One thing about it is that it reminds people of how feminism made a strange turn in the 1970s. Giving up on the idea of persuading women en mass to eschew intimate relations with men, feminism adopted legalized abortion as its cause. Obviously, abortion would have little market if it were really possible to get women to "say no." Although the film isn't terrific, IT SHOULD BE WATCHED! It should be watched to see what people in the 1950s thought a feminist would look like and be like and what feminism would champion. Does anyone in this era think a feminist is a dowdy stout woman in a long dress who stays home and knits? As I've already pointed out, a feminist movement that successfully championed celibacy would not be tied to "abortion rights." I want to add that I saw this routine programmer because I'm a fan of the relatively little-known Peggy Maley, the blonde beauty cast as Midge. I thought Maley did well with her lively but small part. She certainly looked sexy and bright but she almost always did. Here's to Peggy!

Frank Ross distinguished himself in various ways - he was married to one great actress (Jean Arthur) and one acting joke (Joan Caulfield), he produced a couple of Sinatra titles (The House I Live In, Kings Go Forth) and a fairly risible pseudo-religious entry (The Robe). Somehow he got the idea he was equipped to direct a film and given that his second wife Caulfield was sorely in need of a vehicle that may remind viewers she had once been in the same film (Blue Skies) as Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, coming a bad nowhere despite co-star billing, he must have seen this as a chance to kill two birds with one stone. Alas ... the teaming of two actors of monumental unequal talent (David Niven and James Robertson Justice) was only eclipsed a couple of years later when Fred Astaire wiped the floor with Jack Buchanan in The Bandwagon and the chemistry between Niven and Caulfield could only have been eclipsed by Garbo and Mr. Bean. One best forgotten.

Short on laughs, sometimes even embarrassing to watch, it makes me wonder what this film would have been like WITHOUT David Niven. His performance is so wooden and he seems so bored with the whole thing. Joan Caulfield, not a well known name, does a really good job, actually, playing the ying and yang of her character.Niven seems TOTALLY OUT OF PLACE, a part someone like Tony Randall or Jack Lemmon could have banged out of the park (maybe it was a bit before their time...) Not a bad premise, has been stolen and used repeatedly in movie history, but it seems listless and lifeless when Niven is on screen. Oh, well.