Spotlight

Spotlight Date: 1-December-02
Spoiler Rating: Medium

Gigi (1958)

I enjoyed "Gigi" when I was young, but I was always aware that I didn't understand it. Something about the sexual politics and romantic brokering eluded and slightly disturbed me; I knew that it all worked out for the best in the end, but I wasn't sure how or why, or even what dangers our heroine had managed to avoid. In my ripe old age, I now see that this is perfectly fitting for a picture which eulogizes the beauty of childhood innocence. "Gigi" isn't a stellar musical, but it is a very clever, very entertaining, and very adult romantic film.

The year is 1900, the place is Paris, and, for the city's fashionable crowd, the pursuit is love. Not the kind of love that makes you want to be a better person or settle down with your childhood sweetheart and raise six kids, but love as war, love as art, love as a carefully planned and executed, full-time career. For men, this means you must have money to spend on love nests, jewels, clothing, and trips to Venice; for women, this means you must have youth, beauty, the decorative female accomplishments, and a willingness to endure a life that, basically, adds up to high class prostitution followed by spinsterhood. The stars of "Gigi" are all devotees of the business at various stages: Honoré Lachaille (Maurice Chevalier), the randy old dog who has yet to give up the game; his nephew Gaston (Louis Jourdan), one of Paris' leading young lovers who is getting bored with the life; Gigi (Leslie Caron), a teenaged girl destined to become a professional mistress like her mother and grandmother before her; Grandmama Alvarez (Hermione Gingold), who is raising Gigi and was once a lover of Honore's; and Aunt Alicia (Isabel Jeans), a retired coquette who tutors Gigi on how to be desirable and exists in a sort of delusional haze of long ago amorous conquests.

The life of romance in which these people are entangled is shown to be gay and colorful and exciting, of course, but also quite seedy --- all of which makes an excellent backdrop for a movie. Director Vincente Minnelli doesn't stint on scenes of gorgeous women and their paramours at fabulous nightclubs wearing splendid outfits and dancing and laughing with charming abandon, nor does he fail to dish out the full measure of the script's biting and extremely amusing satire on the shallowness of such an existence. (I particularly love the scene when Honoré breaks out the champagne to celebrate after Gaston drops his lover and she attempts suicide.) There's never any real disgust directed at the life of the career lover --- Honoré is lovingly depicted as a carefree geezer who has been perfectly happy all his life --- it's just that you can't take it seriously, and it comes up lacking when compared to the richness of what Gigi has to offer, particularly to her long-time friend Gaston. In our even more debauched age sentiments like "Thank Heaven for Little Girls" would never fly, but as "Gigi" illustrates, there is an undeniable attraction in innocence which is all the more potent for its having an expiration date. There's nothing inherently wrong with becoming an adult, except that, especially in Gigi's world, this requires that you leave behind not only your innocence but your true feelings and self-respect as well. "Gigi" isn't so much about becoming a woman or finding true love; it's about not giving in to the commonplace cynicism and disinterest that grown-up society often demands. For Gigi, this means holding on to what she has; for Gaston, this means rediscovering what he has lost.

Gaston visits Gigi whenever he wants a break from superficiality, and the chemistry between them is wonderfully palpable; he absolutely blooms when she cheats at cards or gets him to sneak her sips of champagne. It isn't any surprise to us, watching them together, to discover that they were made for each other, but it is a huge surprise to everyone else, for whom love is not about laughter and friendship and letting your hair down, but about cunning and modishness and acting a predefined role as perfectly as possible. Powerless as all such women are in her society, Gigi agrees to accept the fate which Gaston offers in the standard terms of his lifestyle, but in the end the real affection he feels for her (probably the only real emotion he's ever felt) proves to be the saving grace of both.

"Gigi" is not Lerner and Loewe's best effort (that would be "Camelot"), and the limited vocals of the movie's cast do nothing to enhance the musical experience. (The title song, for example, should be delivered with all the swelling exuberance of newly discovered love, not in a flatish chant.) Still, the dialogue is sharp, the humor is delightful (Aunt Alicia is simply a treasure), the actors are first rate, and the love that Gaston and Gigi could share, if only they could leave the rulebook behind and prevent her from becoming jaded, is deliciously rendered, giving the story real weight and importance. While I liked "Gigi" as a little girl without understanding it, I find that, viewed through adult eyes, it gains in depth and loses nothing of its freshness and charm.

Copyright © 2002 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.