Monte Carlo **** (1930, Jeanette MacDonald, Jack Buchanan, Claud Allister, Zasu Pitts) – Classic Movie Review 11,156

Producer-director Ernst Lubitsch’s 1930 Paramount Pictures black and white film Monte Carlo is a witty, delightful early talkie musical starring Jeanette MacDonald as Countess Helene Mara, who, though about to wed silly Duke Otto von Liebenheim (Claud Allister), leaves him at the altar, flees on a train to Monte Carlo and checks into a hotel.

At the casino, Count Rudolph Farriere (Jack Buchanan) takes a liking to her but she won’t even look at him and so he takes on the disguise of a hairdresser. She hires him and falls in love with him but cannot marry him as she thinks he is a commoner.

The performing is superlative, with charming stars Buchanan and MacDonald both on tip-top form, plus amusing turns from Zasu Pitts (as Bertha) and Allister. Innovative use of sound and image by stylish director Lubitsch broke new ground in this underrated, fast-moving, fun-filled musical.

A plethora of fine songs include ‘Give Me a Moment Please’, ‘Always in All Ways’, ‘She’ll Love Me and Like It’, ‘Days of Days’, ‘Trimmin’ the Women’, ‘Whatever It Is, It’s Grand’ and especially ‘Beyond the Blue Horizon’, with MacDonald, leaning out of a train window, singing the best-known song in the film. ‘Beyond the Blue Horizon’ (by Richard A Whiting and W Franke Harling, with lyrics by Leo Robin) became a hit record for MacDonald and again in the 1970s when it was covered by Lou Christie.

The screenplay by Ernest Vajda is based on the Booth Tarkington novel Monsieur Beaucaire, which was previously filmed by Rudolph Valentino as the silent drama Monsieur Beaucaire (1924) and later by Bob Hope as the comedy Monsieur Beaucaire (1946).

Also in the cast are Tyler Brooke as Armand, Lionel Belmore as Duke Gustav Von Liebenheim, John Roche as Paul, Albert Conti as Prince Otto’s Companion, Helen Garden as Lady Mary in Stage Opera, Donald Novis as Monsieur Beaucaire in Stage Opera, Erik Bey as Lord Windorset, Billy Bevan, David Percy as Herald and Frances Dee.

The songs are written by Richard Whiting and W Franke Harling, with uncredited music by Karl Hajos, Herman Hand, Sigmund Krumgold, and John Leipold.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,156

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