Lively, entertaining reviews of, and essays on, old and newer films and everything relating to them, written by professional author William Schoell.

Thursday, February 15, 2024

THE NOTORIOUS LANDLADY

Kim Novak and Jack Lemmon
THE NOTORIOUS LANDLADY (1962). Director: Richard Quine. 

Newly arrived in London, Bill Gridley (Jack Lemmon) of the U.S. Embassy, looks for a flat to rent and winds up in the beautiful townhouse of Carly Hardwicke (Kim Novak). His boss, Ambruster (Fred Astaire) thinks the name of his employee's new landlady sounds familiar, and he is horrified when someone in the research department reminds him of just who Mrs. Hardwicke really is. It seems that her husband vanished without a trace several months ago, and now everyone is convinced that the "notorious" woman murdered the missing man! Before Ambruster can order Bill to find new quarters, Inspector Oliphant (Lionel Jeffries) importunes him to stay where he is and find out whatever he can about the supposed black widow. 

Jack Lemmon and Fred Astaire
The first half of The Notorious Landlady is delightful, full of suspense, and bolstered by fine performances from the entire cast. Astaire makes his character more likable than he might have been had he been played by another actor. There are also good turns from Estelle Winwood [The Magic Sword], Maxwell Reed [Daughter of Darkness], Henry Daniell [Siren of Atlantis], and Phillipa Bevans. The second half of the film, after certain revelations have been made, goes a bit awry, with perhaps too much running around and the hasty unveiling of tricky plot points, but it recovers at the end with an amusing and exciting chase sequence backed up by the strains of Gilbert and Sullivan. Good show!

Verdict: The picture and the cast have a lot of charm! ***

2 comments:

angelman66 said...

Need to see this again. I had a hard time getting into it recently. Kim seemed a little 'false' and her accent was sub-par. (Hate to say it because I adore her.)

William said...

Well, remember she only uses the accent (which IS mediocre) for the first few minutes when she's pretending to be British, then she drops it when she admits she's American to Lemmon. Try it again sometime. No masterpiece, but the cast is quite good.