Irma La Douce (1963)
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86% of critics liked it
(14 reviews) -
76% of users liked it
(5,648 ratings)
This romantic comedy opens with a resounding warning: its chief concerns are passion, bloodshed, desire, and death. "Everything," exclaims the narrator, "that makes life worth living." Irma La Douce (Shirley MacClaine) is Paris' most prosperous prostitute. Wise, endearing,… More This romantic comedy opens with a resounding warning: its chief concerns are passion, bloodshed, desire, and death. "Everything," exclaims the narrator, "that makes life worth living." Irma La Douce (Shirley MacClaine) is Paris' most prosperous prostitute. Wise, endearing, and compulsively clad in green, Irma rules the rue Casanova. She triumphantly works the most coveted corner on a street where the cops gladly look the other way and the naughty johns leave tips. Her street is a content community of live and let live and good-natured desire, an Augean stable of human understanding. However, to upright Nester Patou (Jack Lemmon), the area's new policeman, genial wrongdoing is still wrongdoing. Freshly promoted from day patrol at a children's playground, the scrupulous Nestor arrests Irma and her colleagues in a bumbling, unauthorized raid. He takes pity on Irma, but harasses the guilty johns -- including the police captain. Promptly unemployed, Nester returns to the scene of his crime, the rue, and to Irma. After physically besting her pimp, Nester unwittingly takes his position. The two fall madly in love, but Nestor quickly grows jealous of Irma's patrons. Thus, he masquerades as a wealthy English aristocrat and becomes Irma's sole customer -- only to eventually grow violently jealous of himself. Soon enough, this formally righteous cop is comically jailed for his own brutal murder! As the film's prologue promises, Irma La Douce is a celebration of life from beginning to end -- unabashedly adoring lust, emotion, fervor and, above all, foolish love. ~ Aubry Anne D'Arminio, Rovi
- Directed By
- Billy Wilder
- Written By
- Alexandre Breffort, Billy Wilder, I. A. L. Diamond
- Genres
- Romance, Classics, Comedy
Unrated,
- In Theaters
- Jan 1, 1963 Wide
- On DVD
- Sep 18, 2001
Critic Reviews
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Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
A good example of how a movie can be utterly characteristic of its maker and still fall with a resounding thud...
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Geoff Andrew, Time Out
Wilder's soft-centred cynicism provides frequent enough laughs without too many longueurs.
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Bosley Crowther, New York Times
Mr. Lemmon is little short of brilliant...
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Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com
One of Billy Wilder's lesser films, Irma La Douce relies entirely on its two stars, Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine, neither of whom is particularly good or funny, despite the masks and the accents.
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Jeffrey M. Anderson, Combustible Celluloid
Wilder somehow sustains the lively pace and humor for the two-and-a-half hour color comedy.
See more critic ratings and reviews on Rotten Tomatoes
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Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)
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Cast
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Jack Lemmon
as Nestor Patou/Lord X
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Shirley MacLaine
as Irma La Douce
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Lou Jacobi
as Moustache
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Bruce Yarnell
as Hippolyte
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Herschel Bernardi
as Inspector Lefevre
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Hope Holiday
as Lolita
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Joan Shawlee
as Amazon Annie
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Grace Lee Whitney
as Kiki the Cossack
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Paul Dubov
as Andre
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Howard McNear
as Concierge
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Cliff Osmond
as Police Sergeant
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Diki Lerner
as Jojo
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Herb Jones
as Casablanca Charlie
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Tura Satana
as Suzette Wong
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Lou Krugman
as First Customer
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James Brown
as Texan Customer
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Bill Bixby
as Tattooed Sailor
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Harriet Young
as Mimi the Mau Mau
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Sheryl Deauville
as Carmen
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Billy Beck
as Officer Dupont
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Edgar Barrier
as General Lafayette
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Richard Peel
as Englishman
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Joe Palma
as Prison Guard
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John Alvin
as Customer
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Donald Diamond
as Man With Samples
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Louis Jourdan
as Narrator
- James Caan
- James Brown (II)
