but if you want a funny romantic comedy to go along with them - look out; you are in trouble with this film. I knew this film was going to be iffy when Sophia Loren was taking pot shots at a bicycling mail carrier in the opening sequences. Subsequent jokes all center on her penchant for shooting people and other inanimate objects around the château where she is in exile. People fear to approach her for fear they will get shot. NOTE she is apparently trying to shoot people! Funny, huh?
Sophia gets better when she contrives to meet John Gavin. After Sophia's mildly humorous overnight attempts to seduce Gavin in the hunting lodge, it's all downhill until the end. After that night, Sophia receives forgiveness from the emperor, and she is able to return to Vienna. Her character is transformed from vamp of the nobility to staid fiancée of the Prussian prince. Thereafter, she and Gavin are acting in some light, romantic drama, while the rest of the cast struggles to maintain the comedy. The comedy all centers on the efforts of Sophia and her parents to hide her indiscreet meeting with Gavin from the emperor's top "morality cop." That aspect of the film is occasionally mildly humorous. But whenever the overly- earnest Gavin and the now staid Sophia intrude, the light drama takes over and the film goes flat. Unfortunately Gavin was never meant to appear in comedies; he has no sense of comic timing or delivery.
I can recommend this film only for die-hard Sophia fans.
Sophia gets better when she contrives to meet John Gavin. After Sophia's mildly humorous overnight attempts to seduce Gavin in the hunting lodge, it's all downhill until the end. After that night, Sophia receives forgiveness from the emperor, and she is able to return to Vienna. Her character is transformed from vamp of the nobility to staid fiancée of the Prussian prince. Thereafter, she and Gavin are acting in some light, romantic drama, while the rest of the cast struggles to maintain the comedy. The comedy all centers on the efforts of Sophia and her parents to hide her indiscreet meeting with Gavin from the emperor's top "morality cop." That aspect of the film is occasionally mildly humorous. But whenever the overly- earnest Gavin and the now staid Sophia intrude, the light drama takes over and the film goes flat. Unfortunately Gavin was never meant to appear in comedies; he has no sense of comic timing or delivery.
I can recommend this film only for die-hard Sophia fans.