June 15, 2008
Silent Sunday: I Don't Want to Be a Man (1918)
Ernst Lubitsch offers an early glimpse of the joys of Weimar cinema with this cross-dressing comedy about a young girl who emancipates herself by dressing up in men's evening clothes and going out on the town. She supposedly learns some lessons about how hard men really have it, but I don't think Lubitsch is convinced, and besides, he's more interested in the romantic possibilities of the situation. Ossi's romanced by her Teutonic tutor, who thinks she's a he, but things don't turn out the way they do in countless Hollywood comedies of gender confusion.
The film is available on DVD as part of Kino's exquisite "Lubitsch in Berlin" set, which contains a good cross-section of the light comedies and historical epics he made before heading west to Hollywood in 1923.
Posted by mike, June 15, 2008 10:29 PM