Lili **** (1953, Leslie Caron, Mel Ferrer, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Kurt Kasznar, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Amanda Blake, Alex Gerry) – Classic Movie Review 6196

Director-choreographer Charles Walters’s captivating, Oscar-winning 1953 MGM musical stars Leslie Caron as the naive French orphan and teenager Lili.

She joins a travelling carnival as a waitress and meets a sad puppeteer called Paul (Mel Ferrer) and a sophisticated carnival magician named Marc (Jean-Pierre Aumont). At first she falls for her handsome womanising protector Marc, whose stage name is Marcus the Magnificent, but then she finds she really loves the carnival’s crippled puppeteer Paul (Ferrer).

The highlights of the film include Caron’s enchanting performance, the Technicolor photography, an Oscar-winning Bronislau Kaper score (with the evergreen song ‘Hi-Lili, Hi-Lo’, which was not even nominated) and Lili’s dance with life-size puppets.

Helen Deutsch’s screenplay is taken from Paul Gallico’s short story The Man Who Hated People, which first appeared in the 28 October 1950 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. Gallico later expanded his story into his 1954 novella The Love of Seven Dolls.

Also in the cast are Kurt Kasznar, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Amanda Blake, Alex Gerry, Ralph Dumke, Wilton Graff, George Baxter, George Davis, Mitchell Lewis, Fred Walton and Richard Grayson.

It is shot in Technicolor by Robert Planck, produced by Edwin H Knopf and designed by Cedric Gibbons and Paul Groesse. Famous puppeteers Walton and O’Rourke made the puppets.

Kaper won the Oscar for Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture. The lyrics for Hi-Lili, Hi-Lo were written by Deutsch for her previously published short story Song of Love and Kaper’s setting of the song is performed by Caron and Ferrer.

The 1961 Broadway hit musical called Carnival was based on the film.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 6196

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