I’m Putting You First: How to Steal a Million (1966)

Most Romantic Moment #10

So I’ve mentioned before how this film was one I had been searching for, for a long, loong time. When I was young I watched a movie about stealing art that took place in France, but couldn’t remember the title, just the one scene. I was pointed toward To Catch a Thief, but it wasn’t how I remembered the film.

I figured I just had faulty memory and was done with it.

Over ten years later, I decided to watch this movie as I love Audrey Hepburn and Peter O’Toole. As I started watching it, I had this sense of deja vu, but I was certain I’d never seen it before. It wasn’t until they played the one scene that I realized this was the movie I had been thinking of the whole time.

Finally!

This is an absolutely hysterical heist film. Audrey plays Nicole Bonnet, daughter of a forger and leading citizen of Paris. She has been trying to get him to stop to no avail.

Parents

One night, she catches a bungling burglar, Simon Dermott (Peter O’Toole), who is more than what he seems. He likes her and tries to date her; but she wants nothing to do with him.

Meanwhile, her father has allowed the museum to take the famed Cellini‘s Aphrodite (a forgery done by Nicole’s grandfather) for an exhibition. After he has signed off the museum paperwork, he discovers that the museum will be testing the statue in order to insure it.

Both Nicole and her father know that such tests will show that it is a fake and bring ruin to both Bonnets. In order to stop it, Nicole hires Simon to steal it for her, using one  incredibly crazy scheme.

Most Romantic Moment: I’ll Protect You and Your Family

*Spoilers*

So the most romantic moment comes at the end of the film. Simon and Nicole have successfully stolen the sculpture and Simon is hiding it.

Simon Dermott: [about the Cellini Venus] Oh! She’s fine. She’s wrapped up in one of my old shirts, just as snug as could be. I rocked her to sleep in my arms last night.

He takes Nicole out to dinner, and reveals that he isn’t an art thief. He is actually a private detective who specializes in art forgery; finding the criminals and gathering evidence that will send them to prison.

Yeah not good for Nicole or her father. But because he loves Nicole he decides to not prosecute her father, (as long as he promises to not make or sell any more forgeries).

How romantic

This is HUGE! It is his job! If word got out he would be in big trouble, and probably end up in prison for obstruction or accessory charges.

But for a man who has never settled and was only focused on work; he decided to put the girl he loved and her happiness first.

To start Romance is in the Air: Part IV from the beginning, go to I Can’t Pretend, I Have to Be: Casual Sex? (1988)

For the previous post, go to You’re Sad So I’m Making This Day Extra Special: The Bikini in the Soup, Bones (2011)

For more Audrey Hepburn, go to Heart and Soul

For more Peter OToole, go to What is This Thing: Phantoms (1998)

For more heist films, go to I’m Here for You: The Italian Job (2003)

For more private detectives, go to I Don’t Care What You Think, She’s My Girl: A Trip to the Dentist, Veronica Mars (2005)

Quite A Horror Story: Agatha Christie’s Poirot Hallowe’en Party (2011)

She is…a teller of the tall tales, a boaster, a little liar. So when she claims to have witnessed the murder, nobody believes her. And yet, she is… dead. 

So this was a film done by the BBC based on Agatha Christie’s novel, Hallowe’en Party. I think David Suchet is a perfect Poirot, as he looks just the way I always imagined Poirot to look like. However, something I don’t like about the modern retellings, is that  they tend to change a lot of the plot lines of the novel, and usually not for the better (Third Girl was awful. They didn’t use the best twist from the book). Rarely do I watch the film version before reading the book, which I did here, so I didn’t have the same unpleasantness as seeing them change plot lines that I thought were crucial in the book.

So the film starts out with Poirot’s friend, and mystery writer extraordinaire, Ariadne Oliver helping with a children’s Halloween party. All the kids are playing around, laughing, bobbing for apples, eating candy, etc. A little girl named Joyce starts talking to Oliver, telling her that she once witnessed a murder. Everyone makes fun of her, teasing and insulting her as she tends to always tell “tall tales”. No one believes her.

Later the children are all playing snapdragon, which they make sound so creepy. Instead of playing background music throughout the film, they play the children’s voices chanting the song in unison. It is as creepy as The Crucible scene when the girls are all “possessed”.

After the game is done, they are rounding up the children and discover Joyce missing. She is found drowned in a bucket that was used for bobbing for apples.

Oliver wastes no time at all, but immediately calls in Poirot to solve the case.

Poirot immediately looks into which murders in the town are unsolved, to see which ones have the potential to be the one Joyce saw. Many try to discourage him from doing so, telling him that Joyce was a liar and a storyteller. She did it to feel important and show off. Poirot is firmly decided that whether or not Joyce was telling the truth, someone out there is guilty of murder and thinks Joyce was a witness.

The possibilities of who Joyce might have seen are Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe, the aunt of Rowena Drake’s late husband, apparently died of a heart attack. Her death is suspicious because of her will, it said that her au pair was to inherit everything over the family. Authorities believe that it was faked by the au pair, Olga Seminoff, who mysteriously disappeared after the forgery was discovered. Other candidates for murder involve Charlotte Benfield, a sixteen-year-old shop assistant found dead of multiple head injuries; Lesley Ferrier, a lawyer’s clerk who was stabbed in the back; and Janet White, a schoolteacher who was strangled.

Which one is the murder Joyce saw? Who committed it? Did Joyce even see a murder occur? Just like The Bad Seed, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and The Secret Window, this is one you have to check out for yourself and see where the truth lies.

The only thing I don’t like about this film, is the fact that Poirot disapproves of those who take enjoyment in such a holiday as Halloween. He thinks the macabre is not something you should be so joyous about. Well, I don’t; I love watching horror movies and getting into Halloween. That’s why I did my 31 Tales of Terror and Woe. In fact today marks 11 days left to Halloween! 😀

Here’s today’s scary post. More to come!

To start Horrorfest from the begining, go to I Don’t Belong in the World

For the previous post, go to I’m No Warrior, I’m an Assistant Pig-Keeper

For more on murder, go to Camp Blood

For more on Masterpiece Theater, go to A Hunky Helping of Manwich

For more on Halloween parties, go to A River of Candy Corn Runs Through It

For more film adaptions of books, go to I Bid You Welcome

For more on bobbing for apples, go to A Halloween Hello from the Austen Men