(1946)
4
Bob Mastrangelo
Cluny Brown is another charming Ernst Lubitsch satire on the aristocracy and, aided by a wonderful script, Lubitsch fills the story with light (but well-aimed) social observations. While Lubitsch's primary targets are the upper classes, and their ostrich-like approach to the world around them, he is also critical of the provincialism that opts for ignorance and the unquestioning allegiance of servants to a class system that keeps them on the lowest rung. As always with Lubitsch, there is a steady stream of sexual innuendo, not the least of which is Cluny's fascination with plumbing (she repeatedly boasts of how she loves to "bang the pipes"). This culminates in a wonderful scene in which Cluny's obsession for plumbing shocks her prudish suitor, Wilson, and his friends and family. The funny lines come fast and with an expertise of delivery that makes them feel impromptu. Among the best: "Where's your sense of adventure? Are you the type of man who puts on his pants before he answers the telephone?" and "When the lower classes start throwing away pound notes, the upper classes better look out." Only in a Lubitsch film could you find a dapper-looking Charles Boyer being confused for a plumber, and among the other throwaway gags are the recurring sights of Boyer taunting Wilson by ringing his doorbell and running away before detection. Boyer and Jennifer Jones are fine in the leads, but Cluny is the sort of character that, a decade later, Audrey Hepburn or Leslie Caron would have turned into a more layered personality. Richard Haydn steals most of his scenes as the prissy Wilson, and Una O'Connor gives a terrific turn as his mother in a performance that contains no dialogue, only grunts.
Cluny Brown on AllMovie
Cluny Brown (1946)
