I think the reason why I love this film so much is that it’s so unapologetic in the way it rejects any hint of cynicism. Cluny, so uncertain and so unguarded, is allowed to be herself the whole way through, and the story doesn’t try to change her in order to make her desirable to men. It doesn’t disparage her interests and hobbies, it doesn’t present her as an object to be mocked or ridiculed. The characters in the story either accept her, or they don’t, but she doesn’t change in service of a cheap punchline. She is, simply, herself.

Do you ever just feel so thoroughly comforted by a movie? I just want to watch and rewatch Cluny Brown endlessly. Like, Charles Boyer has a monologue in this film about plumbing, and it’s one of the most romantic lines of dialogue I’ve ever heard. Seriously.

4.25/5

Everyone deserves someone who'll tell them that pursuing their passions makes them more desirable, not less.

get you a man who throws your ugly maid uniform out the window of a moving train!!!

After the more epically scaled Heaven Can Wait, Lubitsch concluded his career with one of his most supple works, a perfect sublimation of his sexualized class comedies in which a plumbing-obsessed flibbertigibbet enjoys a sense of camaraderie with an anti-Nazi Czech. Along the way, Lubitsch mines their interests for double-entendre comedy, as ever, but he also demonstrates the somber aspects of hidebound class structures. The two scenes in which Cluny (played to earnest perfection by Jones) is humiliated for daring not to "know her place" are more savagely heartrending than anything else in the director's filmography.

In Lubitsch's first five sound films, someone opens and closes a door every 60 seconds. But here in his last film, he introduces comedy as still life.

This gets an additional half star on a rewatch, because Jennifer Jones is much funnier than I remembered as the titular Cluny, a free spirit who doesn't know her place in life who is shipped into service, and Charles Boyer is all Gallic charm as the chancer who comes into Reginald Gardiner's house to see an old friend.

Cluny is delightful with her 'Persian cat feeling' and this Lubitsch sparkler is as naughty as a post-Code film could be. And that supporting cast! The bushy-browed Aubrey Smith, young blood Peter Lawford, Richard Haydn (who is marvellous), Florence Bates, twitchy Una O'Connor, and Dublin's finest Sara Allgood (Hitchcock's Juno).

The Lubitsch touch is still evidence in his final film, which has the gloss of his earlier pieces and a fair amount of the fun which was evident in 'The Smiling Lieutenant', 'Trouble in Paradise' and others.

 I would build you the most beautiful mansion, with the most exquisite and complicated plumbing, I would hand you a hammer, and say "Ladies and Gentlemen, Madame Cluny Belinski is about to put the pipes in their place".

So so lovely and sweet it almost makes you sick. Cluny is the loveliest character I’ve ever come across, that perfect balance of quirky while still maintaining a sense of groundedness and authenticity. This is so comforting and warm, the romance isn’t overbearing or forced, it’s just a delight to watch these two leads dropped into a world so out of context, refraining from changing even the slightest part of themselves to fit in because why should they?

Such a nice way to start 2019 and such a fantastic way for Lubitsch to end a career.

I love the way Charles Boyer says 'Cluny Brown' when he sees Jennifer Jones in the movie. It's like he's discovering something new each time he says it. And every time he says it I smile.

If I had known Boyer I would've changed my name to Cluny Brown, just to hear him say it whenever he greeted me.

The film was a real fuck you to the British upper classes, suggesting that they were out of touch with the dangers that Hitler posed before WWII. It was quite popular in the US, but in the UK not so much. It caused such an uproar that C. Aubrey Smith, an actor who personifies the old-timey British upper class for me and who has a small part here, actually apologized for being in the film.

But really it's such a likable film. Jones is wonderfully funny, and Boyer's trolling of the local chemist is worth a watch alone.

literally invented romance!! i for one support cluny brown in all her plumbing endeavours

In Hyde Park, for instance, some people like to feed nuts to the squirrels. But if it makes you happy to feed squirrels to the nuts, who am I to say, "nuts to the squirrels?"

Lubitsch heard one good double-entendre equating penises with pipes and decided to stretch it into a complete screwball comedy. The result is effervescent and effortless feeling considering that it for some reason also involves scientists escaping the Nazi's. It's a mish-mash that makes no sense if you think about it, but when they finally pay-off the plumbing punchline they've been building too all movie you either have to laugh or swoon.

Ernest Lubitsch under appreciated film with Jennifer Jones as Cluny Brown. She’s from the lower depths and as handy with a wrench as a man. She gets tossed into class recognition when forced to play maid at an estate in the country. Charles Boyer is her savior as a man ahead if his time who can truly appreciate her and save her from her English fate. 
Lots of great performances from all players. 
The Criterion Channel 
Year: 1946
Grade: B+

RIP FilmStruck, bless you for introducing me to this Lubitsch gem

cluny brown has one bad scene and i have decided to just treat it as non-canon because almost everything else about this movie is perfect. lubitsch went absolutely hog wild for this film. the joke pacing is pretty nuts, especially for a movie from this time, and every character gets made fun of except for cluny. as much of a ditz as she is, lubitsch admires her so much. i do too! cluny is wonderful. also, pretty much every line in this film is saying something about class and gender politics (or happiness), and the movie is pretty woke for the 1940s—this movie isn't very regressive, even today, though it doesn’t necessarily do or say everything right. regardless, my girlfriend and i love this movie so much, and part of that is because some of this movie’s ideas still feel applicable in our own lived experience today.

Light comedy that's more cute than outright funny, but buoyed by the charming performances of Boyer and Jennifer Jones.

Bon. Ça l'air que je suis vraiment une fan girl de Lubitsch.

Spine #997

so love has been real this whole time and no one was going to tell me

"if I was a sheep I'd be happy to serve the empire."

loses some steam as it goes but it's quite literally perfect for at least an hour so, like, I'll take it.