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Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

If you love romantic comedies then this passes as easy watching.Douglas and Colbert gel but the script lacked sparkle . When I analyse Colberts career it has to be said that she really isn't in many that you would describe as classics,that have stood the test of time.Her performances are generally excellent but often in mediocre films

My heading above much more accurately describes this movie. Maybe they didn't want to give away the plot, for some strange reason. I think this is just one of those instances when the producers stuck with an early title and didn't think to change it. Anyway, this movie is an entertaining, if far-fetched, story about a love triangle. Or, more like a love quadrangle at the start and finish.Claudette Colbert is the focus of the triangle, and her two main suitors vying for her affections are wonderfully played by Melvyn Douglas and Robert Young. The humor comes mostly in the sparring between the two competitors. "I Met Him in Paris" isn't one of the wittier comedy romances that Colbert made; but it has its occasional clever or really goofy line that will cause a laugh. Kay (Colbert) is a New York fashion designer who has been saving and planning a three-week trip to Paris for five years. Early in the movie after her arrival in Paris, she goes into the American Restaurant in the high-class hotel where she's staying. She asks the maître d' if he speaks English, and he calls for a particular waiter. The waiter's line floors Kay: "Madam. You have the ask to wish for me you pleasure." After Kay's recovery and a couple questions about his English, he says he learned English from a Japanese house boy from America. Later, after she has met George (Douglas) and Gene (Young), she dances with George who is admittedly a terrible dancer. As they walk back to their table, George says, "Did I do that?" Kay says, "Oh, no. I was limping when I came in."The best humor, and most of it in this film, comes from a number of escapades. The trio leaves Paris for Switzerland, with George to act as chaperon of Gene and Kay. There is a nice long scene of Kay and George ice skating. Another long humorous adventure has Kay and Gene skiing downhill. A third has all three them bobsledding. Naturally, with all this winter activity, the film has some beautiful scenery. The outdoor stuff was shot at Sun Valley, Idaho, with scenes that could pass for the Swiss Alps. I mentioned that the plot was pretty far-fetched; but one must remember that the majority of people were very proper with relationships in that time. So, it's conceivable, but not very likely, that a single attractive woman (she is obviously playing a mature young woman – not a teenager or young girl), would go off for a week of fun in the snow with two men. Of course, the language barrier aspect was needed in this film to get the one funny situation with the waiter who knew a bunch of English words but not how to use them to make sense. The film was made in 1937, and most upscale restaurants in Paris would have had English- speaking waiters and maître d's then. Their English cousins across the Channel would have been going to Paris for decades to vacation, shop, do business or for entertainment. And, since WWI especially, many Americans would be traveling to "gay Paree" for the same reasons. But then, maybe that was another subtle funny of the film – since it was the American Restaurant.

I Met Him in Paris (Wesley Ruggles, 1937) is a pleasant little romantic comedy that keeps threatening to turn into a more interesting, adult film, but never really explains its central tenet: why sourpuss Melvyn Douglas must chaperone young lovers Claudette Colbert and Robert Young on their sojourn from Gay Paree to snowy Switzerland. In addition, the Paris setting isn't effectively utilised - presumably it was just a suitably exotic spot for Colbert to be romanced as well as a nice hook for the title - while the Swiss one brings largely slapstick peril. But the leads were consummate performers capable of lifting the most unpromising material and they make a good fist of it here. Lee Bowman is fun in support as Colbert's "trusting" suitor, in a David Niven-like turn. The snowbound scenes were shot at Sun Valley, Idaho, the setting for Fox's hit musical Sun Valley Serenade. The ending, with three men squabbling over the lead, was later borrowed for the Jean Arthur film The Lady Takes a Chance.

Two clunkers in a row - first Bluebeard, then I met him in Paris. The clothes are great, the settings lovely, and the script - a mind-boggling inane conglomeration of improbable and contrived situations that must have contributed to the demise of the screwball comedy. A series of wealthy people with too much time on their hands, acting juvenile (or madcap, as they used to call it). Everyone here has been better elsewhere. Douglas and Young are both in love with Colbert, and three high-tail it off to Switzerland, as the question surfaces: who will Claudette end up with? Of course, Melvyn Douglas is billed above Robert Young, so we know what the outcome must be. As much as I love old films, and Colbert, and Douglas, and Young, I stuck this one out, but it never really gelled for me.