bkoganbing
Watching That Lady In Ermine I was wondering what Betty Grable was doing in a project that seemed to be aimed for Marlene Dietrich to do. Someone over at 20th Century Fox may have decided one sex symbol is as good as another. Darryl F. Zanuck should have known better.Betty plays a 19th century Italian countess whose domain has been invaded by a troop of Hungarian Hussars captained by Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Her ghostly ancestor whose portrait hangs in the palace hall along with the rest of her distinguished family tree, sees no small resemblance in Doug now and another invader some 300 years earlier whom she dealt with when armies failed.Besides that the current Betty has just been married to Cesar Romero and the invasion has come at a most inopportune moment, before things have been consummated. That's going to give anyone a bad attitude, I guarantee.Fresh, wholesome all American Betty is NOT the actress to do seductive and mysterious. Marlene Dietrich might have put this over, but with Betty it falls flatter than yesterday's presidential candidate. She and Fairbanks have no chemistry at all, though Doug is as charming as ever and someone I can watch in anything.Frederick Hollander and Leo Robin wrote the score for this film and This Is The Moment got an Oscar nomination for Best Song. That Lady In Ermine's one chance for Oscar glory fell to Buttons And Bows.Ernest Lubitsch died midway during the film and Otto Preminger finished That Lady In Ermine. I can't believe Lubitsch had Grable in mind for the lead here. Neither will you if you see That Lady In Ermine.
dougandwin
Let me start out by saying that I used to really like Betty Grable, particularly from "Down Argentine Way", but by the time she got around to this disaster, she had also got "round" and frankly the whole film was an embarrassment. Costarred with Douglas Fairbanks JNr (who must have been fairly desperate) the story was bad, the colours good, and the film far too long. It had some of the old standbys in it like Harry Davenport and Reginald Gardiner to try and stimulate interest but with no success. The music score was woeful, and I have to say not one tune was memorable in any way....as I was such a fan of Miss Grable, I always wish I had never seen this one!
Greg Couture
If you have the opportunity to catch this one on TV (It's in American Movie Classic's library, I believe, and doesn't appear to be available on video.) and you're a fan of Ernst Lubitsch, don't expect much evidence of his famous "Touch." Herr Lubitsch died before completing very much of this production and the directing reigns were turned over to Otto Preminger. Apparently the studio felt that an artist whose ancestral origins shared to some degree those of Mr. Lubitsch was the proper person to complete this project. My own impression of the final results makes the passing of the talented Mr. Lubitsch a great misfortune for all concerned. As I watched it on a TV broadcast several years ago I stared in amazement at what seemed an extraordinarily clumsy and heavy-handed attempt to tell what is, essentially, a fairy story for adults. There are definitely elements to enjoy and Betty Grable is, as always, appealingly lovely in Technicolor and has a lively and natural presence as an actress. But Mr. Preminger's reputation, without later critically praised films, such as "Anatomy of a Murder," was not greatly enhanced by the final cut of this film.
kate-143
In 1948 this was my all-time favorite movie. Betty Grable's costumes were so ravishing that I wanted to grow up to be her and dress like that. Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., was irresistible as the dashing Hungarian officer. Silly and fluffy as this movie might appear at first, when I was eight years old it seemed to me to say something important about relations between men and women. I saw it again the other day; I was surprised to find that it still did.
AD
