GIGI 1958 MOVIE MOVIE

Gigi is being groomed for a life of domesticity, although being a mistress would prevent her from legitimacy making Gaston’s marrying her at the end a saving of sorts.

GIGI 1958 MOVIE MOVIE

It’s unfair to apply modern feminist perspectives to this movie as the 1950s concept of domesticity and passivity are here.

The intent is for the audience to hate Liane and justify Gaston’s hatred of Paris, but really his hatred appears to have been there long before Liane if it wasn’t the movie doesn’t do anything to tell us otherwise. He takes out his lady love, Liane (a perpetually grinning Eva Gabor), and is shocked that she’s “not thinking about me.” Considering the man’s sitting like a slapped ass and hates everything, why would she want to think about you? Later on, when she finds another man who apparently appreciates her, Gaston acts indignant while Honore eggs him on about “male patriotism” and how Liane needs her comeuppance. Both characters are insufferably condescending and misogynist, but it’s masked through Chevalier’s kindly old man routine he just wants to “thank heaven for little girls,” amiright?! Gaston is worse he’s so content to say everything is “a bore,” yet acts shocked when people treat his boredom with contempt. The real problem lies with Gaston and his uncle, Honore (Maurice Chevalier). She can’t help it if she’s written to be the pawn of the story.

This is a Cinderella story without even a glass slipper to bind the two lovers.īut, of course, the issue isn’t with Gigi. Instead, Gaston comes to the conclusion he loves Gigi, for equally unexplained reasons. There’s no lead-up to this revelation, and it comes without any fanfare or epiphany. The romance between her and Gaston develops in a moment of explanation, and almost immediately Gigi declares she’d rather be miserable with him than without him. We’re never told if this is what she wants, or anything considered a personal desire. In a two-hour film we spend about 40-minutes with Gigi herself, mainly going to lessons and montages about what to do to entice a man (sniff cigars, identify fake jewelry). She has an absentee mother obsessed with making it as a star of the stage, so the girl is raised by her Aunt Alicia (Isabel Jeans) and grandmother (Hermione Gingold) to be a man’s mistress, not wife, but mistress. Leslie Caron starts the film dressed up like Madeline. The title might be Gigi, but we know little about her other than what men think or want from her. It seems as if the movie wants to elevate women to the status of Paris itself, but really they’re nothing more than the Eiffel Tower, a beautiful object whose picture you want to take. The opening song, the iconic “Thank Heaven for Little Girls” (hilariously shown as the pervert’s lament in My Father, The Hero), situates the film as a tale about men and the beauty that surrounds them, best exemplified in women. Many of the problems I have with this film were mimicked in my review of Leslie Caron’s debut, 1951’s An American in Paris primarily, Caron’s character is a mere object for male fantasy. We probably got the best interpretation with Moulin Rouge!, and even that movie didn’t exactly end with “happily ever after.” Gigi touts itself as a Cinderella story, but if Cinderella in the 1950 Disney version possesses more agency than a woman in 1958, you have a problem. Gigi would have trouble being made today. When Gaston realizes Gigi is no longer a little girl, he starts to wonder if she’s wife material.

Her best friend is the town playboy, Gaston Lachaille (Louis Jourdan) who’s bored by everything Paris has to offer. Gigi (Leslie Caron) is a young Parisian girl being groomed by her aunts to be a man’s mistress. My apologies to those who enjoy this movie…you won’t be pleased by my thoughts. Unfortunately, time and an increased awareness of classic films and women have only made the movie’s flaws stand out even further. I’d seen it years ago and didn’t care for it, but figured I’d give it the benefit of the doubt my youth colored my perspective. I originally had zero plans to review Gigi. This is what happens when inspiration knocks.

Gigi 1958 movie