‘Irma la dulce’ is one of Billy Wilder’s comedies that the passage of time has turned into a masterpiece, a satire of the sexual morality of the early 60s. However, in order to lift it, Wilder had a hard time, first because of get a good deal and then because of the bad reviews. The film is available on Filmin.
Wilder had always admired Federico Fellini’s film ‘The Nights of Cabiria’, the story of a big-hearted prostitute and he really wanted to do something similar. In 1956 a French musical entitled ‘Irma the Sweet’ had been released to great success, which was at Bradway from September 29, 1960 to December 31, 1961, and saw the opportunity to take it to the screen. But Wilder, whose ear for musicals was provervial (he said he was unable to whistle, sing or play the piano, that he was totally ‘amusical’), decided to cut out all the musical numbers. It would be a kind of tale, as ‘Les noches de Cabiria’ was, about the relationship between a witty and adorable Parisian prostitute and a witty gendarme who will become her pimp and who becomes jealous of her girl’s ‘clients’. Obviously a very thorny issue, especially in the early 60’s when the Hays Code was imposed with an iron hand on Hollywood productions. The solution was going to be a farce tone, completely unreal with hilarious situations. And Wilder himself and his right-hand man, IAL Diamond, began to write the script where, in addition to deleting dances and songs, very little remained of the original musical that had triumphed in Paris and Broadway.
‘Irma la Dulce’ tells the story of Néstor Patou, an innocent and idealistic Parisian gendarme transferred from a children’s playground to the Les Halles neighborhood. Next to the central market of Paris, the ‘red light district’ where Casanova street is full of prostitutes who work at the Hotel Casanova. He tells Nestor noticing the activity of so many girls on the street late at night, but when he finds out he orders a raid on the hoel where the girls carry out their activity. In the middle of a raid, one of the ‘clients’ arrested turns out to be Inspector Lefevre, Nestor’s superior boss; both he and the rest of the gendarmes are aware of prostitution, but tolerate it in exchange for money. The inspector gets Néstor fired. Expelled from the police force and humiliated, Néstor finds himself hanging around the same neighborhood where he finished his career as a gendarme; thus, he ends up in the Chez Mustache tavern, a resting place for prostitutes and their pimps. In the midst of a rough patch, Néstor befriends Irma la Dulce, the most popular prostitute, and the owner, a man known simply as Mustache, who is apparently a simple bartender but often tells stories about his life before the bar. , in which he boasts of having been, among many other things, a professor of economics at the Sorbonne or an obstetrician in Equatorial Africa, and always ends his narrative by saying “… but that’s another story.” After defending Irma in an altercation with her pimp, a bad-ass brute named Hippolyte, Nestor moves in with her and, swayed by her good heart, soon finds himself pimping Irma.
A character named Lord X
Jealous of Irma’s relationship with other men, Néstor devises a plan to get Irma out of prostitution, but soon discovers that it won’t be as easy as he thought. Thus, through a disguise he transforms into a character called Lord X, a British lord who ends up becoming the exclusive client of Irma with whom he only plays cards. In short, this plan backfires on him, as he has to work more and more like Nestor, working all day unloading meat at the market, to pay Irma as Lord X; Furthermore, Irma begins to suspect Néstor’s behavior. When Irma decides to leave Paris and go with the false lord, Nestor ends the lie; Not realizing that he is being followed by Hippolyte, he throws his Lord X costume into the Seine but Hippolyte, who has not seen him change and only sees the clothes floating, deduces that Nestor has murdered the lord and denounces him. Before the impending arrest, Mustache advises him not to reveal Lord X’s story, telling him “The prisons are full of innocent people who told the truth”, and Nestor admits to killing Lord X for his love for Irma, prompting him to she admires him even more.
Locked up in prison, but with Irma’s love, Néstor is sentenced to 15 years of hard labor; through Mustache he finds out that Irma is pregnant, escapes with the help of the innkeeper and takes refuge in Irma’s apartment. When the police come looking for him, Néstor simply puts on his gendarme uniform again and blends in with the rest of the agents. Using Hippolyte, Mustache directs the search towards the Seine, from which he emerges disguised as Lord X, thus dismissing the murder charge, since the dead man is alive. He immediately runs to the church to marry Irma. During the ceremony the pre-delivery contractions begin, and the baby is born just after the wedding. While Néstor and the rest of the guests attend to Irma, Mustache notices a guest who remains alone in the first pews of the church. As he gets up and walks past Mustache, he is shocked to see that it is Lord X himself. Mustache looks at the camera and says once again “…but that’s another story.”
Wilder had problems casting: For the character of the naive policeman he had thought of Gene Kelly and for the character of the prostitute he thought first of Marilyn Monroe, then of Elizabeth Taylor – “too energetic for her character”, Wilder would say – and still later in Brigitte Bardot, but her English was very poor. Finally, the filmmaker decided to repeat, three years later, his partner from ‘The Apartment’, Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. Both had a long interview with Marguerite, a Parisian professional prostitute, seeking to document and prepare her role, but this was not necessary, since all the social and personal problems were put aside here. More complicated was the choice of the character of Mustache the innkeeper who is aware of everything. Wilder wanted Charles Laughton, with whom he had worked on ‘Witness for the prosecution’. The British actor, already ill with cancer, was enthusiastic about the character and even offered some ideas about him to Wilder. But unfortunately Laughton passed away before filming and Wilder had to find a replacement in a hurry. Finally he opted for Lou Jacobi, although for him it relatively shortened his intervention, which works as narrator, which in the original script was much longer.
Billy Wilder took the opportunity to criticize the sexual morality and hypocrisy of the average American. The film, for which a meticulous reconstruction of the Red Light District of Paris was carried out, all in sets, contains brilliant dialogues. The script includes phrases that have made history, such as “being honest is like plucking a chicken in the wind, you fill your mouth with feathers”, or “in this world we live in, love is illegal, but hate is not”, and revolves around the relationship that is established between a gendarme, somewhat naive, and a kind-hearted prostitute who seeks to redeem herself and change her life.
A conventional ending
The ending seems like an attempt to reestablish a social order, a return to normality with Néstor, Lemmon’s character, accepting his reinstatement in the force, but wanting to go back to taking care of the children’s playground, a task he performed before arriving in Paris, to live with his new family in a quiet way. IAL Diamond commented: “The prostitute is one of the most pervasive figures in literature and she has always held a special fascination for writers and audiences alike. On screen she is portrayed simply as a tough “hostess” or as a tragic figure leaning against a post. But the ones that swarmed around Les Halles, regardless of her personal problems, were a boisterous bunch. And this is the spirit that we tried to capture on film.” The sordidness of the theme was greatly softened by Wilder due to the mischief, the caricature, the humor, the dialogues, the colors, the setting, the soundtrack… Everything was like a fantastic tale in which nothing can be real, although the The filmmaker also included a few depth charges: “I wanted the action on the market. No one ever mentioned the symbolism of raw meat for sale. That too,” Wilder said.
The film was shot entirely at the Samuel Goldwyn Studios in Hollywood in 1962 on a budget of $5 million. The film had its premiere in New York on June 5, 1963, where the full objection came. It was a success with the public but not with critics. Wilder recalled that “the critics weren’t happy, but the public was. The only people who objected to immorality were men. I think they have dirtier minds. Women found it amusing.” Its premiere in France took place on October 9, 1963 with great success. Of course, in Spain it was absolutely prohibited and it could not be released, with some cuts, until October 6, 1969 in Barcelona and December 15 in Madrid. The passage of time has turned it into a comedy masterpiece, and it has completely eclipsed the musical it was inspired by.
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