Melvyn Douglas

(On Cable TV, March 2019) I don’t think today’s audiences can quite approach Ernst Lubitsch comedies with the same thrill as they did upon release: Social attitudes are not what they were, and the impish sense of the perverse that powers his comedies has often been outpaced by progressivism. But Lubitsch wasn’t just there to shock for comic value: the execution of his films was based on a solid sense of sophistication that, frankly, has rarely been equalled since. That Uncertain Feeling, for instance, takes on a comedy of remarriage as its topic, casually bandying around a divorce as if it was no big deal for a woman to leave her husband for an eccentric new man. It’s all sophisticated like many comedies of the time were, set within the upper-class Manhattan set with more romantic comic worries than money problems. Built on witty dialogue, much of the humour comes from characters acting unusually calmly to stressful situations … although That Uncertain Feeling’s biggest laughs come from having them revert to type and punch someone who aggravates them. The character work isn’t bad either—while Merle Oberon is splendid as the wayward wife and Melvyn Douglas does some great seething, Burgess Meredith is a highlight as a pianist who becomes the object of the female lead’s attention, causing chaos with gnomic utterances, misplaced dislikes, odd anxieties and a complete lack of care. It ends as we may expect, with a remarriage—both because the pretender is hopeless, but more importantly because (and here’s the heartfelt awww underpinning the comedy) our two leads never stopped loving one another. That Uncertain Feeling leaves a clear impression even in modern reviewers: it has aged quite well (perhaps helped along by a freer attitude toward divorce) and while it may not be Lubitsch’s best, it’s sufficiently clever and witty to remain interesting … and funny.