Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris, Review: Ada-girl Harris, the Dior dress is your dress
If Mr. Deeds could go to Town and Mr. Smith could go to Washington, what prevents Mrs. Harris from going to Paris? Mr. Deeds Goes to Town was made in 1936, and was a comedy romance-drama, while Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) was a political comedy. Both were American films, directed by the legendary Frank Capra. Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris (2022, but set in 1957), which has a cute inbuilt rhyme in its title, is a British/FRench/Hungarian comedy, with a few sad undertones. Refreshingly new in its choice of subject – a Battersea maid, a widow, wants to go to Paris to get a Christian Dior dress custom-made for herself – Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris is easy viewing and the invitation might as well read, ‘The Viewers go to the Cinema’.
Ada Harris, a widow who works as a cleaning lady at a minor Lord’s house, becomes obsessed with her Lady employer’s haute couture Christian Dior dress. She likes it so much that she wants to buy her own Dior dress. After suddenly receiving a war-widow’s pension – her husband died in action in 1943, but due to an oversight, she gets the payment 14 years later – and some money at betting, she now has enough money in her kitty to travel to Paris by plane, a bad journey for a first-time flyer like Mrs. Harris, because the channel-tunnel was yet to be inaugurated (that was in 1994). Ada makes friends with some Frenchmen at the airport and sleeps on a bench at night. The next day, she is escorted by one of the Frenchmen to the Dior establishment, where she stumbles into a showing of Dior’s 10th anniversary collection. She is also befriended by André, the Dior accountant, and Natasha, a stunning Dior model. However, the Dior director, Claudine, resents maid Ada’s intrusion into the exclusive world of haute couture, although Ada has the money to buy a dress.
It is 1957 and Dior has fallen on hard financial times. Because Ada will pay in cash, they reluctantly agree to make her a dress. While in Paris for fittings, she stays with André, at his invitation, because his sister is abroad and he has a room vacant. Mrs. Harris encourages him to express his affection for Natasha—who shares his interest in existential philosophy and they have been reading the same books. When Claudine is forced to fire several Dior’s workers for financial reasons, Ada organises a strike and forces Claudine and Christian Dior to hear André’s ideas to modernise and make the business profitable. Ada returns to London with her dress. She loans it to another of her clients, Pamela, a struggling actress, who has nothing impressive to wear to an event and needs to impress her producer. In a bizarre incident, her dress catches fire and is ruined. Ada’s Dior friends read about the disaster in a newspaper and send her another dress, the one that she initially coveted more than the purchased one. This was possible because the original customer faced a lawsuit and could not pay for the dress, and they already had all of Ada’s measurements.
I gather from Internet sources that this film is an official collaboration with the House of Dior, though it is based on a 1958 novel by Paul Gallico. However, whether it is a true story or not, could not be established. If Dior allowed a novel to be published, and a film to be made, with so much of Dior in it, some of it unsavoury, I believe there must be an element of truth in the tale, as far as Ada’s encounters with Dior go. The British parts, however, seem to be more fiction than fact. I had been playing with the title, reading it as Mrs. ’arris, as in Professor ’iggins of Pygmalion, and what do I find? The novel was indeed titled Mrs. ’arris Goes to Paris and was one of four novels by the author, the other three being Mrs. ’arris Goes to New York, Mrs. ’arris MP, and Mrs. ’arris Goes to Moscow. So, don’t rule out a sequel. Written for the screen by four writers – Carroll Cartwright, Anthony Fabian (the director), Keith Thompson and Olivia Hetreed – the screenplay jells quite well and moves almost seamlessly. That a woman is on board is a good sign, for there are many women characters, besides the protagonist herself, so a female touch could have done no harm.
Co-incidences abound, almost too many to digest. Mrs. Harris gets a war widow’s pension 14 years after her husband died in an aerial encounter during World War II, just when she wants to go to Paris. Then she wins the football pools, apparently at first go. This is followed by a win at a dog race where the bookmaker secretly places part of her money on a dog he thinks will win, rather than the “two-legged” creature on whom Mrs. Harris wanted to bank all her money. Then, in Paris, she meets a man who helps her spend the night in peace, and even escorts her to the Dior HQ. There are a series of co-incidences at Dior itself, and some more when she gets back to England. A co-incidence is the easiest way to move a story forward, but to their credit, the writers have imparted some twists within such co-incidences, like the dog-race bet, the Avallons being black-listed and facing prosecution and the manner in which her dress catches fire when her employer Pamela is wearing it, for a special occasion.
Handling Mrs. Harris’s sentiments for her late husband with kid gloves, director Anthony Fabian lets the best come out in underplay. The film is his ninth in 28 years and first in eight, so we see that Anthony Fabian (Skin, Louder Than Words, Freeze-Frame) does not believe in quantity. He lets Ada put up with a lot of nonsense from her Ladyship, but when the water rises above the danger level, she emphatically puts an end to the mental torture she was being subjected to. Throughout the film, good triumphs over evil and meanness, so it is a feel good film in that sense. England and Paris of 1957 are well recreated. There is a minor comic track in which a man, who lives in the same building as Ada’s employer, always passes her, with a young woman in tow, whom he introduces as his “niece”. Point is, every time, the young woman is a different person! That does draw a chuckle, but you do wonder how is it that he descends the stairs at the precise moment when Ada is climbing up? Too much of a co-incidence again.
Unlike her director, lead actress Lesley Manville (Maleficent, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, Misbehaviour, Let Him Go) is prolific. She made her film debut in 1985, and is a talented singer and dancer. Sadly, neither quality was tapped in this film. Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris is all about her, though there are actors with decent parts around her. Manville speaks as much with her silences as she does with her words. Now 66 (she was one year-old when Dior died), she does not look the 35-36 she should have looked, considering her husband was a pilot and died 14 years before. Assuming she was 22 when he died, she should have been looking 36, or thereabouts on screen. Isabelle Huppert as Claudine Colbert is an actress to reckon with, and looks nothing like the 69 she is. Lambert Wilson as Marquis de Chassagne is very convincing as a thorough gentleman who will not impose himself on a lady, even if he feels she likes him. Alba Baptista as Natasha is a show-stopper while Lucas Bravo as André Fauvel, the introverted, bashful lover of Natasha, steals your heart.
Freddie Fox as the Royal Air Force (RAF) officer who brings the good news to Ada fits his part well. Philippe Bertin as Christian Dior deserved greater footage, but he appears sick and weak, keeping in context the fact that Dior died in 1957. Others lend creditable support.
Cinematography Felix Wiedemann is carefully crafted to capture the period and no unnecessary innovative ideas seem to have been tried in the camera-work. Editing by Barney Pilling gives the film just the right pace it needs, though 115 minutes is just a wee bit long. Music by Rael Jones blends so well with the film that it is difficult to recall the pieces two days after the film was seen. Obviously, it was unobtrusive. But I do remember ‘Kiss me once, and kiss me twice’ by Louis Armstrong, and one French number. And, of course, the Can Can dance.
As I wrote this review, I realised that the film was better than I had first thought, immediately after the screening. Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris has grown on me in a mere 48 hours. Wish we critics had the luxury to reflect upon the films we see, for a couple of days, and then pen our reviews. No, Sir. This is the RAMbo age and often it is the fastest fingers (on the keyboard) first. I have had the luxury of posting this review late because I had to write about four films, seen over two days, and this is my last review. Some of my colleagues saw six movies in two days. Theoretically, they could have seen seven. Good luck to them.
Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris was released on 11 July 2022 in Paris (where else?) and has been released progressively in three territories, from where its funding came, coming to India on 04 November 2022. Certainly worth a look!
Rating: ***
