The thing I don't understand about this movie is why they hell Dr. Franz Braun didn't just tell his wife that her best friend was a predatory vampire who was all over him like a fly on a turd? The second he saw Mizzi visiting Charlotte, he could have pulled his wife into another room and told her. Or if he was afraid of Mizzi overhearing, Dr. Braun could have waited til she went home or told her husband Professor Stock.
Then, the next time Mizzi hit on him, everyone could have a big laugh at her expense.
A lot of women would irrationally interpret the news "She's after me" as "I want her." Her first reaction to the news might have been anger at her husband. The truth might have hurt in other ways. The wife might have confronted her friend about it, and she might well have lied: "No, he was after me.
I think he had a baser reason for concealing the truth, though. There was clearly a part of him that wanted to be seduced. Why didn't he at least acknowledge that he and the friend had already met in a taxi when the wife "introduced" them?
I couldn't stand the husband, but part of that had to do with Monte Blue being such an unappealing leading man. Why would any woman prefer him to Adolphe Menjou?
lubin-freddy Hitchcock would often answer the question "Why didn't he/she/they just to to the police?" with "then we wouldn't have a movie".
I see what you're saying lubin-freddy. I could understand and empathize in a second why someone wouldn't go to the police. After all, they don't have the best reputation with a majority of humans on the planet. Sometimes it seems to me that the people who have the most faith and confidence in the police are the people on those juries that let them get away with murder, literally, with a slap on the wrist.
Maybe I'm naive but it seems like a husband could talk to his wife. If the wife is the type who doesn't listen or puts words into people's mouths, then at least the guy could say he tried. By saying nothing, it's like he accepts guilt, as if he's in on it.
What Hitchcock was saying is that it's simply a matter of the degree of suspension of disbelief necessary for basic plot development.
I get your point, and probably thought about it too, when watching the film recently. But I let it go. If it was a drama, and we, the viewers, invested emotional identity with the characters, I could understand the point, and the necessity of creating a realistic dynamic among the characters. But as this is a comedy, a sex-farce, I'm more willing to let it go.
It's complicated because of the fact that she's his wife's good friend. This is a different era, one where maybe a woman could trust her girlfriend more than she can her husband. Telling her something like that might very likely backfire.
Where's your crew? On the 3rd planet. There IS no 3rd planet! Don't you think I know that?
I agree with your point, "This was a different era,..." It was also a time when a gentleman (in the true sense of the word) would NEVER say something unkind or unflattering about a woman. Monte Blue is a very good actor, and gets the point across as his character almost seems to teeter on the edge of what to do...just telling the truth or keeping with his morales.