Le Million (1931)

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

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.

"Le Million" is a 1931 musical directed by Rene Clair. It's wonderful that it's available on DVD for audiences to see and enjoy it. The story concerns a starving Parisian artist Michele (Rene Lefevre) who is having a bad day. He is being hounded by every creditor in town, and as his fiancé Beatrice (Annabella) walks into his apartment, he is embracing his model. Then he realizes that he has won the Dutch lottery with his friend Prosper (Jean-Louis Allibert), but the ticket is in his coat pocket, and the coat is gone. The city-wide hunt then begins for the coat, which was taken by Beatrice and given to a needy person, who sold it to the opera singer Sopranelli. There is a hilarious scene in Sopranelli's dressing room as various people try to get the ticket out of the coat pocket. Beatrice and Michele wind up behind some scenery on the opera stage and relate to the duet that's being sung.This film and Clair obviously influenced such talents as the Marx Brothers, Ernst Lubitsch, and Rouben Mamoulian. All the performances are good, with the beautiful Annabella, a brunette here, a standout as the ballerina Beatrice. Annabella was signed by 20th Century Fox and brought over to America around 1938, made Suez with Tyrone Power, and the two fell in love and decided to get married. In order to dissuade her and his biggest star from marrying, Zanuck offered her several films in Europe, but she refused to leave her fiancée. Zanuck made sure she didn't work much after that, effectively blacklisting her. She had a big Broadway success, worked on behalf of the troops during World War II, and returned to France after her divorce from Power. She retired in 1954. Her radio work with Power, and this film, show what a wonderful actress she was.Very good film - highly recommended.

Rene Clair's groundbreaking musical. If you want to see where songs first drove a story this is the place. This is the story of a starving young artist who finds he's won the lottery just as his creditors come calling. Unfortunately his ticket is in his coat, which is in his girlfriends apartment and has been given to an on the run convict who then... oh but that would be telling.This is a light and frothy story where much of the dialog is sung (most people think this didn't happen until Oklahoma or Andrew Lloyd Webber). Its the sort of movie that they don't make any more, and rarely did when they did. Its sound a film from the early days that plays like a movie from five or six years later. Clair moves his camera around in ways that not even Busby Berkeley was doing (though to be honest comparing the two film makers is unfair since Berkeley was doing essentially stage bound dance numbers and Clair was moving the camera through "the real world"). Its an amazing little movie. and its a charming movie that will just make you smile. Its just a fluffy piece of enjoyment.I'm sorry I can't say more. Its just a nice little movie and thats really all you need to know.

One of a rare breed of films which crosses elements of the silent and sound period. Le Million(1931) is excellent in its comic routes and brilliant in its storytelling abilitites. Rene Clair does wonders with the material which is top notch. Le Million(1931) is an inspiration to any comedy done within the seven decades.

This film was a disappointment, except for one or two moments (the singing cops/the singing crooks, Grandpa Tulip). It felt like a Marx Brothers movie starring Zeppo and Gummo. There's a great, frothy lightness to the film and the constant sense that something really, really amusing is just about to happen-- but it never actually does. I'd class this picture as "interesting," but not really good except as a curiosity.