Idiot's Delight
Idiot's Delight

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- 65/100 based on 1,586 votes

When song-and-dance man Harry Van returns from World War I, he finds work hard to come by. His greatest success comes as straight man in a phony vaudeville mind-reading act with the tipsy Madame Zulieka. While on tour in Omaha he meets acrobat Irene Fellara, and they have a brief romance. Twenty years later while Harry is on tour in Europe with a troupe of leggy blonde dancers, his train is stopped at the Swiss border and he finds himself stranded in the Alps in anticipation ... (Full plot summary below)

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Actors in Idiot's Delight:

Clark Gable
Norma Shearer
Edward Arnold
Charles Coburn
Joseph Schildkraut
Burgess Meredith

Full Plot Details

When song-and-dance man Harry Van returns from World War I, he finds work hard to come by. His greatest success comes as straight man in a phony vaudeville mind-reading act with the tipsy Madame Zulieka. While on tour in Omaha he meets acrobat Irene Fellara, and they have a brief romance. Twenty years later while Harry is on tour in Europe with a troupe of leggy blonde dancers, his train is stopped at the Swiss border and he finds himself stranded in the Alps in anticipation of World War II hostilities. Harry and his chorines take refuge in an Alpine hotel with a group of disparate travelers who are also marooned there. Among them are an American pacifist, British newlyweds, a cancer researcher, a German munitions manufacturer, and a beautiful blonde expatriate Russian aristocrat who looks suspiciously like the Irene of two decades earlier.

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Movie Reviews

Video-Reviewmaster.com - 6/10 by Steve CrumWWII + Gable+ Gable singing! Add Norma Shearer for more MGM star power.
User Review - 8/10 by Rhonda Wclark gable doing "puttin on the ritz" was awesome
User Review - 8/10 by Ruth LVery good comedy with Clark Gable and Norma Shearer. Actually shown with two different endings (I much prefer the "international" ending). A little preachy, but very good.
User Review - 8/10 by Rick RIdiot's Delight (1939) This is kind of a weird movie for Clark Gable. You don't often see Gable doing soft shoe numbers, singing, dancing, and playing in vaudeville gags, but here he is trying to make a living on the stage. Harry Van (Gable) is trying to stay in the business, going from one partner and routine to the other. He isn't all that successful, but you know that he'll keep at it and eventually do good. He meets up with a small-town country girl, and dreamer, Irene Fellara (Norma Shearer) and they sort of hit it off. Although the relationship is kind of doomed from the start, Harry can't seem to forget Irene. Later, Harry is able to get a small troop of dancing girls put together and they're touring Europe and he bumps into Irene in a resort in the Alps just before the Nazis invade the country. Only this time Irene is acting like some over-the-top, campy, Russian aristocrat who is the mistress to a rich industrialist, Archille Weber (Edward Arnold). This is Harry's last chance and you know that he's going to try to take it, as well as Irene. But, war is on the horizon. This is the beginning of the war movies of the 40s and everyone is gearing up for the fight to come.
User Review - 6/10 by Alexa HIt's interesting because it really treads the thin line between cute and heavy, but sometimes the line blurs a little too much for comfort. But hey, Clark Gable sings Puttin' on the Ritz.
User Review - 6/10 by Orlok WRobert E. Sherwood won the coveted Pulitzer Prize for his allegory-like satire Idiot's Delight. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer purchased the film rights to the play, and commissioned Sherwood himself to adapt his play to the screen. The result is this astoundingly poignant classic, which features Norma Shearer and Clark Gable in the third and last of their radiant screen pairings... Wonderfully odd--A Russian Countess on the Swiss border is really an American vaudeville performer in disguise; she's not hiding from anything or anyone, she just wants to be bigger than life. Unfortunately, a second-rate song-and-dance man she once dated is staying at the same hotel, while wartime hysteria is breaking out all around them... Shearer and Gable ham it up to this idiot's delight!!
User Review - 6/10 by bernard aIt's typical 1930's crap but it's "acquired taste" crap, and I'm one of the few people who will eat it up despite of what it really is. Clark Gable seemed to be in his comfort zone a s a vaudevillian, whereas watching Norma Shearer makes me wanna break up with my previous love for her. It doesn't follow the typical fake Countess narratives, although it's not as fun as the trailer makes it to be.
User Review - 6/10 by jay nEnjoyable if dated comedy/drama with Norma giving an amusing Garboesque take on her character. Gable's famous performance of Puttin' on the Ritz is memorable because he is so easygoing and game. Good supporting cast and assured direction also contribute to making this a pleasant diversion. Try and see the version with the international and far better ending.
User Review - 4/10 by Kevin M. WGable interestingly (because he's not what you call your first choice for this kind of role) plays a showbiz hoofer, back from WW1 and on the lookout for any job he can tag. Norma Shearer plays vaudeville carny performer. They meet for one night of love and then part, only to meet up again years later in Europe at the outbreak of WW2. Robert Sherwood concocted this basically anti-war message film but it seems to bear the imprint of many other hands and too many cooks... For instance, Shearer's kooky traveling artist persona grates on the nerves and one wishes Gable, ever a rock, would shut her up just once. Here is a mighty effort, although to no avail. Or in conventional terms: a bomb.
User Review - 4/10 by Private UDon't watch the first twenty minutes...the rest is fairly true to the play, however, if a movie has TWO endings, you'd think they'd get ONE of them right???

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