BlazeLime Strong and Moving!

BoardChiri Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Guillelmina The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Gordon-11 This film is about a woman whose husband is not aware that she married an American guy before. Chaos breaks out when the American husband is invited to their home.The film takes place entirely inside the beautiful residence of a rich couple. Sets are lavish, costumes are dazzlingly beautiful as a result. The songs are fun and got this nostalgic feel to it. The entangled relationships between the seven characters are entertaining to watch, and they kept me intrigued as to how things will turn out between them. Even though it was not easy to catch up with the subtitles, it was still delightful to watch."Not on the Lips" is a fun, light hearted, old style musical. I was told that this style is called "operetta", and I am liking my first exposure to operetta.

Syl In my opinion, I didn't know that this was a musical comedy. The French make the best films around with character driven story lines. This film has a first rate cast but I didn't care for Lambert Wilson's performance as the American, Eric Thomson. I did love Isabelle Nanty as Arlette, the old maid. She was perfect and memorable. Arlette's sister, Gilberte, has a problem. She has three men in her life including her unsuspecting second husband who thinks he's her first, her first American husband, Eric Thomson, who comes to Paris on business, and a young male artist/teacher Charly who prefers older women. The film is first rate in art direction, costumes, music, casting, and writing. I felt Lambert Wilson was out of place and out of tune as the American. But still, this film has memorable characters and can cheer you right up.

jeffbertucen@hotmail.com Like several other reviewers I was taken to the film 'cold' without knowing anything about it, and after several minutes was expecting the somewhat lacklustre tunes and stock-farce characters to tip over into something edgy and contemporary. Mais non. However is this such a bad thing? Given the French predilection for unflinching realism and tragic endings, Pas Sur La Bouche can be enjoyed as a salute to the traditions of the Comedy Francaise, an expression of nationalist (anti-Brussels?) sentiment, and as a crafted product as lovingly detailed as a reproduction Deco sideboard. One is almost expected to read afterwards that Resnais had an ironic or iconoclastic subtext in mind, but the film seems to be charmingly irony-free throughout. There are no patronising modernist jabs at the shallowness of pre-war bourgeois entertainment, and in fact the period is recreated with a warm and sentimental glow. It can be argued in fact that the play has been not so much adapted for the screen as embalmed, for there are definite longueurs, the singing voices are almost uniformly mediocre, and the lack of varied or outdoor settings does detract. All in all, a charming, civilised and unexpected entertainment from one of the self-styled intellectuals of French cinema, and a brilliant recreation of an ensemble of now-forgotten French 'types'. To get an idea of precisely how far comedy has 'advanced' in 70 years, compare with Legally Blonde or My Best Friend's Wedding and you'll see my point.

writers_reign Alain Resnais, darling of the avant garde, continues his journey back to the mainstream and, let's face it, BEYOND the mainstream, with this lush photography of even lusher decors and costumes by Vanity Fair out of Vogue. Nothing wrong with that, of course, if you can get past the hypocrisy. Here we have, set in the twenties, that old standby the second husband who has to cut a deal with his wife's ex, a sister-in-law and two ingenues thrown in for good measure with everyone breaking into song at the drop of a lorgnette. Pierre Arditi does suave as if he invented it and whether by design or accident contrives to sound like Charles Boyer on medication;Mrs. Resnais, Sabine Azema does style as effortlessly as Astaire and Audrey Tatou has cornered the current market in gorgeous. This should be enough to either encourage or deter you. 6/10