Tonight's Movie: The Gilded Lily (1935) - A Kino Lorber Blu-ray Review

THE GILDED LILY (1935), a romantic comedy starring Claudette Colbert, Fred MacMurray, and Ray Milland, is now available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber.

Colbert plays Marilyn, a secretary who takes time every Thursday to meet her friend Pete (MacMurray), a reporter, for popcorn and a chat.

It's clear that Pete's in love with Marilyn and is hoping she'll come to feel the same way, but instead she falls for Charles Gray (Milland), an unemployed man she meets on the subway.

Marilyn and Charles have a whirlwind romance, but Charles is keeping important information from Marilyn: The truth is he's a member of the British nobility, with a fiancee back in England. He's sincere in his feelings for Marilyn but makes an unforgiveable mistake: Instead of telling Marilyn the truth when he sails for England to break things off with his fiancee, he lies and tells her he's headed south to train for a new job.

As Charles leaves the country, Pete breaks a newspaper story about a member of the British nobility having been in the U.S. incognito, not realizing that he's writing about the man Marilyn loves. When she finds out the truth about Charles, she's crushed and understandably feels played for a fool. Pete, angry on Marilyn's behalf, uses the newspaper to exact some revenge on Charles, and in the process Marilyn becomes a celebrity.

MacMurray and Milland were both rising stars when cast opposite Colbert; the film was quite early in MacMurray's career, while Milland had over two dozen credits, slowly working his way up from bit parts into romantic leads. They're each so appealing that the movie's only real flaw is that Claude Binyon's screenplay is forced to create conflicts between Colbert and Milland that are a bit hard to believe. The characters are so head over heels for one another in the early scenes that their breakup gives the film a rather sad undercurrent.

That said, there's a lot of great stuff in the movie, which made a star of MacMurray. He's wonderful as the man waiting in the wings who quietly campaigns for Marilyn's heart while supporting her decisions, even when they're not what he hopes.

Pete and Marilyn's "bench" scenes are fascinating because while they're not actually doing much of anything but talking and eating popcorn, a world of information is conveyed about the characters and their relationship. We enjoy their easy familiarity, with rituals such as Pete removing his shoes while he relaxes. Marilyn's gradual recognition of her feelings for Pete, the man who is always there for her, is extremely well done.

Likewise, when not stuck with dumb choices by the film's screenplay, culminating in a complete letdown about Charles's real values and feelings for Marilyn, Milland is an utterly charming romantic lead. Like MacMurray, his career was on a sharp upward trajectory after this film.

Having seen some fairly bland leading men at times over the years, most recently in the same year's Mae West film GOIN' TO TOWN (1935), the amount of star power exhibited by both actors opposite the always-stellar Colbert is striking. In some ways, actors either have that magic or they don't, and both MacMurray and Milland definitely had it.

The chemistry between Colbert and both her leading men was such that she would make half a dozen additional films with MacMurray over the next 12 years, as well as two more with Milland in the early '40s. Colbert and Milland's next film together, ARISE, MY LOVE (1940), will be reviewed here in the near future.

As I've written in past tributes to Colbert, years later both actors would say warm things about her; MacMurray described how Colbert patiently helped him learn to act for the camera, while Milland said Colbert was "spiritually lovely inside."

For more on THE GILDED LILY and its role in the careers of both MacMurray and Milland, please check out my original review from 2010.

Fans of Colbert will especially appreciate her letter-perfect performance as Marilyn walks the line between her two relationships, her choices always believable. A scene where Marilyn's celebrity is used to draw visitors to a nightclub has a brilliant moment where she levels with the audience about her ability, or lack thereof, instantly winning their sympathy.

It's also of note that the movie has some interesting things to say about celebrity which haven't dated whatsoever in the ensuing decades. At one point Pete comments that Marilyn is famous simply because she's someone with her name in the paper. The recognition that celebrity is often disconnected from actual achievement still has resonance in the age of the Kardashians, who are famous for being famous and not much else.

THE GILDED LILY was directed by Wesley Ruggles and filmed by Victor Milner. It runs 80 minutes.

The supporting cast also includes C. Aubrey Smith, Luis Alberni, Eddie Craven, Donald Meek, Edward Gargan, Tom Dugan, Warren Hymer, and Forrester Harvey.

The Blu-ray print and sound quality are both solid.  Disc extras include the trailer, a gallery of seven additional trailers for other films available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber, and a commentary track by Kat Ellinger.

Thanks to Kino Lorber for providing a review copy of this Blu-ray.

Tweet