The Swan

Even though HIGH SOCIETY was released afterward, this was Kelly's last film before ascending the throne of Monaco on April 18, 1956. It's early in the century, and Kelly is a young woman of noble parentage. Her mother, Jessie Royce Landis, is eager to marry her off to Guinness, the crown prince. Kelly is being tutored by Jourdan and falls in love with him during the strains of a Kaper tune, "The Swan Waltz," but it's for naught. Landis' brother is Brian Aherne, who has given up the royal ermine for monk's cloth and is against Landis' obvious attempt to marry off Kelly. He thinks his niece should be allowed to make her own decisions of the heart. Landis' sister, Winwood, is a dotty old woman who has all the best comedy lines as she comments on the shenanigans in a pixilated fashion, sort of like the female version of Cecil Kellaway in so many movies. Guinness comes to see Kelly and doesn't pop the question, so Jourdan is enlisted to play a love rival, thus causing Guinness to finally ask for her hand and be granted it. The story, written in 1922, was vaguely about the Hapsburgs and in 1956 it seemed out of synch with what was going on in the world, though not necessarily what was transpiring in Kelly's life. She had gone from a Philadelphia debutante to model to award-winning actress, and was now about to become a queen. This movie would have been immeasurably helped by songs and screamed to be treated as a musical rather than a straight comedy-drama. It's the stuff that operettas are made of, and many of the anti-monarchist jokes are totally lost on modern audiences. The Biltmore estate in North Carolina stands in for the European castle. (official distributor synopsis)