Lili

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Buy This Item Lili by MGM (Warner)  Available from Amazon  $14.98  on 11-15-2008     The wonderful Leslie Caron stars in this Oscar-winning musical fable with a touch of the bizarre. Caron plays Lili, a recently orphaned waif hopelessly in love with a carnival magician. Mel Ferrer plays Paul, a gruff puppeteer who can express his softer side only through his puppets. Sound weird? It is. Caron's performance is lovely. She is, as always, a graceful dancer, but she is also able to pull off the much more difficult task of making Lili pure and innocent without being icky--she talks to Paul's puppets with complete conviction. (The puppets, by the way, are incredibly creepy.) Younger viewers will take <I>Lili</I> at face value, but adults may well get sucked into its unintentional dark side: homelessness, suicide, emotional repression, and giant dancing puppets all come into play. Also enjoyable is Zsa Zsa Gabor, who does a great job standing around looking pretty as the magician's assistant. <I>--Ali Davis</I> Reader Reviews Thr title role in this Gallic charmer is played by Leslie Caron .Lili Dauner is a 16 year old girl ,an orphan following her father's recent demise .She has walked to a small provincial town where she has been promised employment in a bakers's shop only to find the job fails to materialise and that the owner of the shop has wandering hands .Escaping with honour barely intact she takes up with a small time travelling carnival being employed initially as a waitress.She is smitten with the carnival magician ,Marco the Magnificent (Jean-Pierre Aumont),a flambouyant and self absorbed man who lives with the attractive Rosalie (Zsa Zsa Gabor).She is oblivious to the love felt for her by the carnival puppeteer ,an embittered former classical dancer Bertholet (Mel Ferrer)a man only able to demonstrate his feelings for her through the medium of his puppets .She becomes part of the act as the other puppets manipulated by Bertholet and his friend Jacquot(Kurt Kaznar)dispense advice and seek to ease her pain .She sees him only as a drunk mourning his past carrer ,snatched from him by accident ,when the chance arises to move the act upmarket her sorrow at her unrequited love for Marco and anger towards Bertholet as major barriers that need to be overcome . Caron is sweet and charming as Lili bringing the right gamine quality to the role and Mel Ferrer is exceptional as Bertholet while gabor's performance represents a career high.She shows herself to be a capable actress and the always reliable Kaznar is solid and dependable as ever.Aumont did not cut it for me but otherwise this is well acted even when you consider the human actors are hard pressed to match the charm of the puppets .It also benefits from deft direction by Charles Walters ,fine cinematography from Robert Planek and an Oscar winning score by Bronislau Kapek which includes that feather light beauty of a song "Hi-Lili Hi Lo". The two ballet sequences were not to my taste being a tad long drawn out but overall this has charm and style .It reaally should be on DVD but whatever the format its worth your time and money

Lili Available from Amazon Price: $14.98 Updated on 11-15-2008.

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