The Shop Around the Corner (1940)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

Ernst Lubitsch

Writers:

Samson Raphaelson (screenplay)
Miklós László (play)

Release Date:

12 January 1940 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Romance | Drama

Plot:

Two employees at a gift shop can barely stand one another, without realizing that they're falling in love through the post as each other's anonymous pen pal.

Plot Keywords:

Gift | Pen Pal | Post Office Box | Hospital | Jealousy

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Margaret Sullavan	...	Klara Novak
James Stewart	...	Alfred Kralik
Frank Morgan	...	Hugo Matuschek
Joseph Schildkraut	...	Ferencz Vadas
Sara Haden	...	Flora
Felix Bressart	...	Pirovitch
William Tracy	...	Pepi Katona
Inez Courtney	...	Ilona Novotny
Sarah Edwards	...	Woman Customer
Edwin Maxwell	...	Doctor
Charles Halton	...	Detective
Charles Smith	...	Rudy

Runtime:

99 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

USA:Approved (certificate #5967) | Canada:G (video rating) | USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | USA:TV-G (TV rating) | Finland:S | Sweden:Btl | UK:U

Company:

Loew's

Trivia:

While directing this movie, Ernst Lubitsch drew upon his extensive experiences working in his father's Berlin shop as a young lad. At the film's January 25, 1940 premiere at Radio City Music Hall, Lubitsch remarked, "I have known just such a little shop in Budapest...The feeling between the boss and those who work for him is pretty much the same the world over, it seems to me. Everyone is afraid of losing his job and everyone knows how little human worries can affect his job. If the boss has a touch of dyspepsia, better be careful not to step on his toes; when things have gone well with him, the whole staff reflects his good humor.

Goofs:

Continuity: Before they leave the store room Alfred takes 10 boxes and Klara 8. After a cut suddenly Klara carries 10 boxes and Alfred has 8.

Quotes:

Klara Novak (Miss Novak): All my knowledge came from books, and I'd just finished a novel about a glamorous French actress from the Comedie Francaise. That's the theater in France. When she wanted to arouse a man's interest, she treated him like a dog.
Alfred Kralik: Yes, well, you treated me like a dog.
Klara Novak (Miss Novak): Yes, but instead of licking my hand, you barked.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Il y a longtemps que je t'aime (2008)

Soundtrack:

Ochi Tchornya (Dark Eyes)

It's a wonderful world.

The Stewart /Sullavan relationship and the warmth which flows on the screen are only one bend in a most extraordinary river.Although "extraordinary" is not the right word,because everything here is ordinary,no hero,no spectacular events and however,something happens.

The shop is a life microcosm,with its little quiet joys and its bitter disappointments,but,Lubitsch,here very close to Capra ,proves that virtuous gents like Stewart character can triumph in the end;and the final scene of the lovers is one of the wittier in the whole cinema.We seem to know all the clerks in the shop as if we've known them for years,and their everyday life is depicted with love and affection.The yuletide spirit is captured with a lot of emotion-check the scene between the boss and his new delivery boy Rudi and predates "it's a wonderful life" by five years.

The main topic is the fear of solitude.The shop is the place where everyone can feel he is part of a family,a family sometimes truer than the real one (see the boss's wife).And the director wants to make sure that ,when they leave their work on Xmas night,everyone is not on his own.A masterful conclusion.

The remake "you've got mail" featuring Ryan and Hanks is politically correct to a fault.All Lubitsch's movie charm and poetry seem to have been swallowed by the computers.