It begins to outstay its welcome just over halfway through (practically the whole movie is confined to one cabin on a ship), but this movie is way more entertaining than I expected. If this is really Chaplin’s “worst” movie, as I’d been led to believe, then I have even more respect for him than I ever had before, ‘cos Countess had me laughing out loud even more than some of his older productions. I’ve never been a huge fan of sixties comedy, it can often get overpoweringly stupid, but Marlon Brando and Sophia Loren are a surprisingly perfect match for this farcical romance. Loren is fairly Audrey Hepburn-ish as the Countess of the title, and Brando is hilarious, especially in the earlier scenes where his life is being systematically upturned by her appearance in his cabin. As I said, it runs out of steam towards the end and could probably be around thirty minutes shorter (though Tippi Hedren brightens things a little), but it’s definitely worth a look.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 1st, 2005 at 1:50 pm in 3 hearts, Movie Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.