MR. & MRS. SMITH (RKO 1941) Warner Home Video
Alfred Hitchcock once mused, if he had decided to make
Cinderella, his audience would be looking for a body in the coach. Point well
taken. Not everything Hitchcock made was spun into box office gold, and, the
few times he did endeavor to veer away from his tried and true 'wrong man'
formula, proved just how much the public had come to expect a certain kind of
stylish thriller from the master of suspense. The demand for Alfred Hitchcock’s
services, following the back to back smash hits of Rebecca and Foreign
Correspondent (both in 1940) was overwhelming. While producer, David O.
Selznick toyed with the idea of developing future in-house projects for his
star director, Selznick’s own ambitions on several other mega-projects
throughout the decade resulted in Hitchcock being loaned out like a prize bull for
some quick cash, the part of his contract he abhorred most of all. Hitch’s
first release was to RKO where he dabbled in screwball comedy. The result was Mr.
and Mrs. Smith (1941). Scripted by Norman Krasna, the film tells the rather
conventional tale of married couple, Ann (Carole Lombard) and David (Robert
Montgomery) who are struggling to find reasons to stay married. The problem, it
seems, stems from the couple’s ‘one question a month’ rule. Ann asks
David if given the opportunity to go back in time and, knowing then what he
knows now, would he still have married her. In a moment of pure honesty, David
confesses that although he loves his wife, he also misses his bachelor's
freedom, leading Ann to erroneously deduce he no longer loves her at all.
David’s response is made even more problematic when
the couple learns that their marriage is not legal because of a state boundary
dispute. Recognizing he has been free all along and assuming the question is
therefore moot, David decides to propose marriage to his wife again. Only, now
Ann contemplates the practicality of spending the rest of her life with a man
who, however briefly, doubted he had made the right decision aligning his own
with hers. Mr. and Mrs. Smith is admirably nutty – masterfully pulled
off by Lombard's penchant for plying her craft to this frazzled madcap, and, by
Montgomery's willingness to play a sort of Bud Abbott to her Lou Costello. Alas,
given Hitchcock’s prowess in the field of suspense, it remains a little
off-putting, even to enjoy the semantics of ‘he said/she told’ play out without
at least one or two prerequisite moments of heightened suspense. As Mr. and
Mrs. Smith is, in fact, a screwball comedy, no such moments are
forthcoming. And, truth to tell, Krasna’s script is a fairly pedestrian affair –
serviceable, though hardly unique, or worthy of Hitchcock’s time and efforts. One
sincerely wonders what could have possibly been going through the executive brain
trust at RKO to hire the master of suspense to direct a romantic comedy. And,
seemingly aware the material is not of his ilk, Hitch’ shoots the picture with
an uncharacteristic non-Hitchcockian flair. His direction is solid and more
than salvageable, if strangely lacking a real mastery and verve for the genre
that directors like Leo McCarey and Preston Sturges share. In this respect, Mr.
and Mrs. Smith founders - badly on occasion - from a complete lack of
comedic subterfuge. It's an equitable comedy, but not an outrageously ingenious
one.
Warner Home Video’s DVD yields below-par picture
quality. The B&W image is grainy, poorly contrasted and contains a litany
of age-related artifacts. Contrast levels are weak at best. Blacks are a deep
gray; whites, a pale gray. Fine details tend to get lost under the patina of
film grain. The audio is mono as originally recorded and adequately
represented. Extras include a very brief featurette on the film and its
theatrical trailer. Bottom line: Mr. and Mrs. Smith is a disposable
movie in Hitchcock’s canon. For completionists only. All others could choose to
forget it and focus on the incredible works the master of suspense gave us
elsewhere.
FILM RATING (out of 5 - 5 being the best)
2
VIDEO/AUDIO
2.5
EXTRAS
1
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