Ninotchka

#4 in my ranking of Ernst Lubitsch's filmography. There really did seem to be growing pains with Ernst Lubitsch as he entered the early days of the reign of the Hays Office. Angel was a drama that really skirted the line that the Hays Office had its eye on, working in a genre that Lubitsch…

Advertisement

Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife

#27 in my ranking of Ernst Lubitsch's filmography. There's a lot of commentary about why this first collaboration between director Ernst Lubitsch and the writers Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder doesn't quite work, and a lot of it has to do with the casting of Gary Cooper as a millionaire who keeps marrying women that…

Angel

#18 in my ranking of Ernst Lubitsch's filmography. Having his last film, The Merry Widow, cut down heavily in the middle of the release process by the Hays Office, Ernst Lubitsch toned things way down with Angel, a Marlene Dietrich vehicle that still involves a former prostitute and a brothel. It's just way toned down…

The Merry Widow (1934)

#3 in my ranking of Ernst Lubitsch's filmography. I knew that The Merry Widow was Lubitsch's first film subjected to the Hays Office's rules upon its original release, so I was a bit shocked as the film went on and it felt like a bawdy pre-Code film. Thankfully, the actual release process was a bit…

Design for Living

#8 in my ranking of Ernst Lubitsch's filmography. Another hit from Lubitsch. Based on a play by Noel Coward (though, apparently retaining virtually none of the original dialogue), Design for Living is Lubitsch's final pre-Code film and the most frank of his about sex. Of course, frank about sex for Lubitsch is just a couple…