To Be or Not to Be (1942)

Memorable, crazy movie

Fresh and Exciting

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

I was genuinely shocked when the movie began to see Jack Benny in a Nazi uniform and thought how inappropriate that casting decision was, right until it was revealed he was taking part in a documentary on Nazi Germany. So with a sigh of relief, I settled back to enjoy this humorous treatment with Carole Lombard portraying Benny's wife as the couple, Joseph and Maria Tura, became part of the Polish underground in 1939 Warsaw, right on the brink of World War II. I always wonder how films like this might have been received by audiences of the time, realizing that war was imminent, and whether or not the viewing public had reservations about seeing a film treating such a serious topic with humor. In director Ernst Lubitsch's case, he handled the issue with a unique balance of political satire, romance, slapstick and wartime suspense, and if anything, the picture might be even better received today than back in the era in which it was made.Third billed in the film is Robert Stack as a Polish soldier infatuated with Maria Tura, thereby creating a bit of tension for Jack Benny's character in the early going. This situation ultimately turns to naught as Benny assumes a variety of impersonations to foil messages being carried by a German spy to Nazi headquarters. I was a fan of Jack Benny, mostly during his 1950's television show era, and it's uncanny how he affects so many of his typical stage gestures and mannerisms as an actor, along with the recognizable speech pattern. Not to mention the way he obsesses over his 'greatness' as an actor, another aspect of his comic persona. As someone of Polish descent myself, I kept a watchful eye on all of the English to Polish translations utilized in the film and they were handled pretty well. Things like notices at the Polish Theater and gender postings on the restroom doors. I only mention that because I got the biggest kick out of being able to read them. The picture probably could have thrown in a few standard colloquialisms to good effect, but I didn't notice any.If you like this film's subject matter, that is, a mocking comic treatment of the wartime Nazi regime, you might also look up another film from 1942 that takes place on American soil. It's called "All Through the Night", and has a cast headed by Humphrey Bogart and Conrad Veidt, dealing with Broadway gamblers who turn patriotic when they stumble onto a cell of Nazi saboteurs. It's about as silly a story as this one, but with a great supporting cast that includes Peter Lorre, Phil Silvers and Jackie Gleason.

An hilarious satire produced and directed by Ernst Lubitsch from the story by Melchior Lengyel. Werner Heymann received his third of four unrewarded Oscar nominations for his Score; the film was added to the National Film Registry in 1996. #49 on AFI's 100 Funniest Movies list.Jack Benny and Carole Lombard (her last film) star as the leaders of a Polish acting troupe that works to foil the Nazis during World War II in occupied Warsaw. The actors themselves are of the over-the-top variety, so part of the comedy is in the portrayal of the Nazis as buffoons who can be fooled by such "hams", intent on intercepting a spy's information that would damage Poland's resistance movement.Robert Stack plays a Polish officer who is not only part of a love triangle that includes Benny and wife Lombard, but is also the one given the mission to keep the German spy (Stanley Ridges) from delivering his list of resistance members names to the stereotypically brutish German Colonel (Sig Ruman).For patriotic reasons, Benny helps Stack anyway, directing his group of actors (Felix Bressart, Lionel Atwill, Tom Dugan, George Lynn) to play various roles to foil their common foes. Charles Halton (as a theater producer), among others, also appears.

Is difficult to imagine is that comedy so at ease, without the exaggerated facial expressions and movements jokingly, completely just script operation, distinctive characters show and the storyline of the conflicting collision out a very exciting laugh, or a fine sense of humor and amusing humor. Let me think later "La Grande Vadrouille" in the group play interspersed and coincidence echoes. As amazing actor, hapless Colonel, loyal soldiers, war machine heartbeat.Revisit the classic comedy, from beginning to end immersed in the plot to create out of the atmosphere of joy, the director of the comedy elements with effortless, structure, lines, performing, narrative and music and drama are called perfect, textbook style comedy film.

To Be or Not to Be is a film that carries the real horror and dread of Europe facing the threats and devastation of Hitler and the Nazis, and never forgets that, but is also a light, screwball comedy about the art of performance and the enjoyment we all get knowing someone is getting something over on another guy. Lubtisch's filmmaking and comic timing moves like a precise slab of butter (if that's a weird analogy), smooth and on point all the time.It follows a Polish theater company that see a the Germans invading, bombing their town, and the two stars of the company played by Jack Benny and Carole Lumbard, embroiled in a plot with a Nazi-leaning professor and even going up to Hitler himself. Nevermind they don't have Polish (or even most German) accents, they don't bother pretending on that front ironically considering the trickery on hand. This is meant to be a piece of world war two theatricality that can and does endure because it deals with showmanship, actor ego (from Benny with his Hamlet to the side characters trying to get Shylock just right) and playing a character as it's main focus (if there's any modern film that owes It's debt to Lubitsch and how people put on ruses in such high stakes it's Inglouious Basterds, down to a climax in a theater full of Nazis).And as funny as Jack Benny is, especially when his character reacts to that dear of a bomber pilot who has the hots for Carole Lombard, I think Lombard really makes this even better than expected. She's exquisite, ferocious, precocious, sexy, and yet terribly serious about her craft and the people she loves, plus the theater itself. You see just charm and grace radiating off her, and yet she completely gets how to make Mary always reacting and figuring things out. Benny is the big wonderful goof of the movie, while Lombard is the star.Its sublime entertainment and I only regret not seeing it sooner; Mel Brooks made a remake in the 80s which is good but nowhere near the impact of this picture. Just the scene with the Germans marching into town and Lubitsch's cut aways to the citizens looking on in shocked-but-passive disbelief makes it a must see alone.