A brilliant 1932 Paramount offering is available from several public domain labels. My copy from Scooter rates at least 8/10. This is a movie for which there is no middle ground. I looked up the reviews. Half the reviewers thought This Is the Night the worst movie ever made. The other half held that it was the best movie of the year! Guess which half I agree with? I thought it one of the most beautiful movies I've ever seen in my life. I was crying at the finish, it was so wonderful.
This outstandingly attractive girl, played by the utterly entrancing and super-lovely Lily Damita, was being pursued all over Europe by an Olympic athlete played by Cary Grant. Most moviegoers consider Cary to be the handsomest and most desirable man in movies. Trailing along behind this romantic twosome was an old guy played by Charlie Ruggles, a comedian who is always cast as an ardent but perennially rejected old fool of a suitor. He's the comedy relief, you see. We always laugh at his earnest but tongue-tied efforts to impress the girl and his ridiculous bleatings about how much he loves her. Charlie has this part down pat. He plays it in dozens of films. He's been turned down, ridiculed and laughed at by many of the great sirens of the screen. Well, would you believe, at the end of this movie, the most beautiful Lily deals with stumbling, falling-off-ladders Ruggles in an entirely unique way? I couldn't believe my eyes and ears. I cried tears of joy. Who would ever think such a thing was possible? It seems the most beautiful girl is as intelligent as she is lovely. But there's no doubt about it, many movie fans are happier with the routine and conventional. They don't like being challenged by originality. And This Is the Night not only has an ingeniously constructed and highly original script to commend it, but marvelously adroit, sophisticated direction by Frank Tuttle (of all people!) who has evidently sought to out-Lubitsch Lubitsch - and has succeeded beyond all measure!
This outstandingly attractive girl, played by the utterly entrancing and super-lovely Lily Damita, was being pursued all over Europe by an Olympic athlete played by Cary Grant. Most moviegoers consider Cary to be the handsomest and most desirable man in movies. Trailing along behind this romantic twosome was an old guy played by Charlie Ruggles, a comedian who is always cast as an ardent but perennially rejected old fool of a suitor. He's the comedy relief, you see. We always laugh at his earnest but tongue-tied efforts to impress the girl and his ridiculous bleatings about how much he loves her. Charlie has this part down pat. He plays it in dozens of films. He's been turned down, ridiculed and laughed at by many of the great sirens of the screen. Well, would you believe, at the end of this movie, the most beautiful Lily deals with stumbling, falling-off-ladders Ruggles in an entirely unique way? I couldn't believe my eyes and ears. I cried tears of joy. Who would ever think such a thing was possible? It seems the most beautiful girl is as intelligent as she is lovely. But there's no doubt about it, many movie fans are happier with the routine and conventional. They don't like being challenged by originality. And This Is the Night not only has an ingeniously constructed and highly original script to commend it, but marvelously adroit, sophisticated direction by Frank Tuttle (of all people!) who has evidently sought to out-Lubitsch Lubitsch - and has succeeded beyond all measure!