Gigi (1958)

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  February 4, 2008

  brooklynspo

  I like the scene of Jourdan reconsidering at the fountain - done entirely in silhouette. It's a beautiful little dance.
  
  I wonder what other movies might look like with Maurice Chevalier as the narrator. "Oh 'ello! Bonjour! Zis ees New York en 1970 et ziis ees my bon ami Travi... read mores!. Pauvre Travis..."

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• 
  
  February 21, 2012

  cosmo313

  This lavish spectacle of a musical concerning a young precocious girl being groomed to become the mistress of a wealthy playboy in 1900s Paris won a whopping 9 Oscars in 1958, including Best Picture.
  
  It's a dazzling movie, and it is admittedly pretty entertaining, but I don't r... read moreeally see quite what all the fuss was about. I do like a good musical once in a while, and the music here is quite good, but where the story is concerned, this isn't really my thing.
  
  It seems as if the movie is more preoccupied with the music, costumes, and sets, than with crafting excellent well rounded characters and throwing in some subtext. Oh sure, there is a bare bones amount of development and substance, but given how many awards this got, I was really hoping for a lot more. I wasn't bored while watching this, but it really left me a little cold due to being mostly hollow.
  
  The perforamnces are good though, especially Maurice Chevalier who, besides being overwhelmingly entertaining also comes off as more than just a little pervy. Leslie Caron makes a splash in the title role, and she pulls off the change from precocious girl to stunning beauty nicely. Minnelli's direction keeps thigns moving, and the scene where Gaston reconsiders a major decision (done in silhouette) is a stunner.
  
  All in all, a well made and entertaining musical treat, but ultimately not a major milestone or masterpiece. I'm torn between 3.5 and 4, so let's just go with a grade of Solid B.

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• 
  
  October 4, 2011

  fb1341085175

  Na cerimônia do Oscar de 1959, Gigi conseguiu a façanha de levar para casa os nove prêmios para os quais havia sido indicado, incluindo o disputado Melhor Filme e ainda uma estatueta especial para Maurice Chevalier. Fruto da colaboração do diretor Vincente Minnelli e do lendário ... read moreprodutor Arthur Freed, este seria considerado o último grande musical produzido pela MGM (e de fato, o último que rendeu dinheiro). Nos anos 60, o gênero continuaria forte nas telas grandes, mas na forma de adaptação de espetáculos da Broadway (cujo ápice foi Amor Sublime Amor em 1961). Na verdade, Gigi nasceu como uma forma de levar a peça My Fair Lady aos cinemas (algo que seria feito de fato em 1964 pela Warner), trazendo a bordo Alan Jay Lerner e Frederick Lowe, os compositores da obra, para escrever o roteiro e compor as canções baseados no conto da francesa Collette.
  
  Gigi atua como uma ponte entre os clássicos e já então considerados ultrapassados musicais da Metro e as suntuosas adaptações da década a seguir. É possível sentir uma nova influência a medida em que as grandes peças de dança características das películas de Gene Kelly e Fred Astaire são substituídas por números musicais integrais para o desenvolvimento da narrativa. Isso faz com que as canções de Gigi representem não apenas um dos melhores trabalhos da dupla Lerner e Lowe como também de qualquer filme musical. As letras inteligentes e bem-humoradas das composições refletem as características dos personagens e atuam como importantes momentos de exposição dos mesmos. Apesar do tom leve, a história esconde uma camada mais sombria - Gigi (Leslie Caron), jovem parisiense de classe baixa é treinada por sua tia para ser uma cortesã para o alto escalão francês. O ponto de conflito é que ela acaba se apaixonando por Gaston (Louis Jordan), o playboy que deveria ser o seu primeiro cliente. A complexa história de amor enaltece a película e faz com que ela fuja da artificialidade de outros filmes do gênero. Tudo isso reforçado pelo uso de locações da verdadeira Paris, suntuoso design de produção e figurino de Cecil Beaton e da radiante atuação de Leslie Caron. Só mesmo Minnelli poderia se safar fazendo um musical sobre prostituição sem mencionar a palavra uma só vez (e ainda levando um Oscar). E impossível não pensar duas vezes quando um Maurice Chevalie de 60 anos começa a cantar Thank heavens for little girls...

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• 
  
  August 15, 2010

  flixsterman

  For what it is, a 1958 MGM musical, it's fantastic! Some of the best songs ever put to film are here (Thank Heaven for Little Girls, Ah Yes I Remember It Well, etc.). There is an abundance of pomp and fluff but little or no connection to reality. Films such as th... read moreis one certainly have their place as vehicles for escape and fantasy - but it seems odd to envision a 'utopian' society populated entirely with rich, white, upper-crust socialites.
  
  *NOTE: There I go again, projecting 2010 sensibilities onto a 1950s film. Shame on me!

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• 
  
  July 13, 2010

  FrizzDrop

  Though Caron has lacked in Daddy Long Legs and An American in Paris, she truly blossoms as Gigi.

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• 
  
  March 26, 2010

  bottcorecords1

  Maurice Chevalier stars in "Gigi", the winner of 9 academy awards for 1958. Little Gigi is just a school girl who happens to have been befriended by the wealthy Gaston Lachaille. Her aunt Alicia (Isabel Jeans) gives her etiquette lessons, but it's an etiquette which seems groom... read moreed for other things as well. She has a fine collection of jewelry which she shows to Gigi: "this one was given to me by a a little king". Why a little king? Great kings don't feel the need to show off as much. But why does her aunt have so many gifts from so many wealthy men? She was once a mistress, running about in the elite social circles of Paris. The Gaston Lachaille's uncle (Maurice Chevalier) was just the sort of man who ran around with Gigi's aunt back in their day. He's a 70 year old playboy, still chasing after beautiful young women, never settling down to get married (as he says at the beginning of the movie, "those who will not marry are usually men, and those who do not marry are usually women."). He's a jaded romantic if ever there was one, and he's doing his best to train his nephew in the family tradition. Well, it's more than a family tradition, all of society considers him a celebrity and hold him to a different moral standard. What is it about the wealthy that they can't have a happy marriage? It's taken for granted that these men will have unhappy marriages, affairs, and that they will wind up breaking a poor girl's heart, and that the girl should be fully prepared for such a thing. Take Eva Gabor, she's committed many "suicides", generally she takes an overdose that while not quite lethal, is enough to be acceptable in the celebrity circle. Grandmother and aunt seem all too eager to throw Gigi into this mix, even if the times are changing, and girls don't expect the same things out of life that they once did. "Gigi" has alot going for it, especially the wonderful songs which in the last 50 years have become classics. A fun film with unusually adult subject matter (for a 1950s musical, at least).

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• 
  
  October 11, 2009

  sanjurosamurai

  first of all, anything featuring the perfectly beautiful leslie caron is a must see. considered one of the great musicals by most, i found the first half of gigi to be far too slow and purposeless and suffered from the same high society convolution as renoirs rules of the game. ... read more the second half however took off and the film rebounded well to become a delightful and worthwhile classic musical. very good film.

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• 
  
  September 2, 2009

  TomBowler

  i just didn't get into it.

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• 
  
  August 29, 2007

  jennifxu

  I can't shake how pedophilic Maurice Chevalier sounded when he sang "Thank Heaven for Little Girls". I know that's annoyingly immature but antiquated films can have that effect and there's no use trying to hide it. Despite being a trifle contrived, this is a delightful film about... read more social class vs. love and the songs make me smile. I'm only disappointed that Leslie Caron didn't dance. That girl is a marrrrvelous dancer.

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• 
  
  April 20, 2011

  rodriguesmatthew

  The 1958 musical Gigi won nine Oscars, including Best Picture. Why such a piece of fluff like this won, with hardly any memorable songs and a trite plot, is a mystery most including myself will never quite figure out. It's based on a novella by the French novelist Colette, and is... read more derived from the superior original French film made in 1949 and not the 1951 Broadway play that starred Audrey Hepburn (she turned down the film part). It features a vapid score from the My Fair Lady team of composers, the familiar sounding tunes makes it seem like they stole from their own past hit.
  
  The film is set in Paris, France and is about a girl named Gigi (Leslie Caron), go figure. Gigi however doesn't really play much of a role in the plot; most of it is centered on the love life of famous millionaire playboy, Gaston Lachaille (Louis Jourdan.) Gaston, the man-slut, has again broken up with another one of his many love interests, and has become bored with the dating scene in its entirety. In between his carousing, he occasionally stops to visit the house of longtime friend Madame Alvarez (Hermione Gingold) who lives with her attractive granddaughter Gigi. Quite obviously at some point Gigi will become the object of Gaston's affection, but at the beginning of the film it is "supposedly" made she is too young for him as she skips and prances around the house in schoolgirl clothing. Gaston isn't forced to realize that she could become a possible love interest until one day she is seen parading around in what I would call a nice looking' dress. Pedophileyishly, he offers to take her out for tea, and from their things take off.
  
  Without trying to use clichéd; "Gigi" is a tedious, far too stately film. The almost completely static camera positioning really doesn't work here; it positively adds to the cold, aloof feel of the film. It certainly doesn't pass muster as a good social commentary or musical, with only hints of cleverness in the dialogue, and oddly repetitive (like I said earlier, My Fair Lady composers) music. Maurice Chevalier really is underused; he seems irrelevant to the main, boring Pygmalion plot. He has a kind of absurd, dandyish swagger to him that works due to his charisma; he plays up the lecherous old extravagant Frenchman role to perfection. Sadly, after a decent early entrance with Chevalier, Louis Jourdan is very bland and un-engaging. Leslie Caron, a good decade too old for the role, isn't very impressive as Gigi herself. The distance of the camerawork leads to a certain distance from characters that are at best, competently played.
  
  In the end, the surplus of talk, the lack of dancing and of memorable music all contribute to "Gigi" being a very dull, talky film, that struggled to keep my attention. Do yourself a favor and watch My Fair Lady.
  
  Story: C
  Acting: C+
  Direction: D
  Visuals: B+
  Overall: C
  
  ** out of 4 stars

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• Leslie Caron as Gigi
• Maurice Chevalier as Honore Lachaille
• Louis Jourdan as Gaston Lachaille
• Hermione Gingold as Mme. Alvarez
• Eva Gabor as Liane d'Exelmans
• Isabel Jeans as Aunt Alicia
• Jacques Bergerac as Sandomir
• John Abbott as Manuel
• Richard Bean as Harlequin

Click a thumb to vote on that suggestion, or add your own suggestions.

• 
  My Fair Lady (77%)
• 
  Pygmalion (100%)
• 
  Three Coins in the Fountain (0%)
• 
  Singin' in the Rain (76%)

• Who played Gigi in the 1958 movie Gigi?  Answer »
• Audrey Hepburn was offered the lead in GiGi but turned it down ?  Answer »
• What French classic actor links the following films? Gigi Letter From An Unknown Woman Three Coins in the Fountain   Answer »
• When studio executives couldn't get the movie rights to the Broadway hit "My Fair Lady," what similar story did they film?  Answer »

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