It's difficult enough doing one role well, but playing several parts in the same movie is a nearly impossible feat requiring the talents of an Alec Guinness or a Peter Sellers. MacLaine had not yet achieved the maturity or the acting ability to bring this off, and the result is just ol'
Shirl' in a host of different costumes, hairstyles, and makeup. Shot on location in Paris with interiors at the Boulogne Studios, this set out to be a tour de force but ends up only a tour de France.
In the first segment, she's a widow accompanying the coffin of her late husband to the cemetery; on the way, she finds romance with old friend Sellers. The second piece has MacLaine returning to her home to find her husband, Brazzi, cavorting in the sack with another woman. She storms out and
learns some lessons about men from the local streetwalkers. Next, MacLaine is seen as a hippie who attracts the competing sexual attentions of Gassman and Grey, resulting in some lubricious games. In the fourth segment, MacLaine is a grumpy housewife married to Barker, a successful author of
trashy novels that feature a wild, passionate heroine. In order to compete with this fantasy figure, she tries to be equally impulsive, but only succeeds in convincing everyone she's gone mad. The fifth episode has MacLaine as a rich Parisian matron plotting to foil a social rival, Adrienne Corri,
in a dispute over a designer gown. In No. 6, MacLaine and Alan Arkin are lovers married to other people who make an ill-fated suicide pact. The final section of the film has MacLaine, married to Noiret, out shopping with her best pal, Anita Ekberg. When MacLaine spots Caine watching her, she's
flattered that such a handsome man would find her attractive--never dreaming that Caine has been hired to keep an eye on her by her jealous husband.
All of the segments, save the first, run between 14 and 16 minutes. The funeral episode goes about eight minutes, which is all it's worth. Ortolani's music is second-rate, but the rest of the technical credits are all excellent. Special note should be taken of Alex Archambault's hairstyles and the
makeup work done by Alberto De Rossi and Georges Bouban. Although Marcel Escoffier gets credit for the well-planned costumes, it was Pierre Cardin who designed MacLaine's gowns. leave a comment