"Everyone wants to be Cary Grant. Even me." These were the immortal words of Cary Grant, born Archie Leach, a former circus acrobat and vaudeville performer who remade himself as the most debonair movie star of all-time. Always a clothes horse, Grant knew how to look the part of a romantic figure but in order to get the girl, he also had to know what to say. Throughout his career he had been blessed with scripts by some of Hollywood's greatest screenwriters including Ben Hecht, Clifford Odets and Ernest Lehman. However, it wasn't until he had almost retired that he would work with his most simpatico wordsmith, Peter Stone. It is a truism that all classic films start with a solid script and Peter Stone was a great screenwriter. His list of credits in film, television and theatre were enviable, having Oscar, Emmy and Tony awards to prove it. Taking Hitchcock as his model he helped perfect the comedy-mystery genre, starting with this, his first film Charade. With its picture postcard Paris setting, Charade combines all of the most successful elements of Grant's previous screen personas while simultaneously poking fun at them. Starring opposite a youthful Audrey Hepburn, Stone puts 59 year-old Grant through his comedic paces in a self-deprecating, and sometimes even goofy role that exploits his middle-age for appropriate comic effect. In the past Grant had sometimes strained for credibility with his much younger leading ladies but this time Audrey did all the chasing with Cary able to sit back and look bemused by his good luck. To accentuate his aging good looks and gentlemanly charm, Stone and director Stanley Donen, surround him with a rogue's gallery of character faces and types, including the vulgar brutality of George Kennedy, the knife-like precision of James Coburn and the hang dog charm of Walter Matthau. This near flawless cast has much to savour in the delicious wit of Stone's whip-smart dialogue, with Grant in particular playing his urbane banter to the hilt. Stone would soon win his Academy Award for co-scripting Father Goose (1964), Grant's penultimate film, thus confirming the promise of Charade's Edgar Award-winning success. DVD & BLU-RAY
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