Misplaced Pages

Sunshine Susie

Article snapshot taken from Wikipedia with creative commons attribution-sharealike license. Give it a read and then ask your questions in the chat. We can research this topic together.
1931 film

Sunshine Susie
Animated opening title
Directed byVictor Saville
Written byIstván Békeffy (operetta)
Angus MacPhail
Victor Saville
Franz Schulz
Robert Stevenson
István Szomaházy (novel)
Noel Wood-Smith
Produced byMichael Balcon
StarringRenate Müller
Jack Hulbert
Owen Nares
CinematographyMutz Greenbaum
Edited byIan Dalrymple
Derek N. Twist
Music byPaul Abraham
Production
company		Gainsborough Pictures
Distributed byIdeal Films
Release date
  • 6 December 1931 (1931-12-06)
Running time80 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

Sunshine Susie is a 1931 British musical comedy film directed by Victor Saville and starring Renate Müller, Jack Hulbert, and Owen Nares. The film was shot at Islington Studios with sets designed by Alex Vetchinsky. It was based on a novel by István Szomaházy. An alternate German-language version The Private Secretary was made, also starring Renate Müller.

It is also known under the alternative title The Office Girl. The film established Müller as a star in Britain.

Synopsis

A young German woman moves to Vienna to seek work. With the assistance of Herr Hassell, a friendly commissionaire and budding conductor, she gains a job as a typist with a banking firm. Unknown to her, the man she takes to be a lowly clerk with the company who romances her at the local beer garden. is in fact the bank's director.

Cast

Reception

The film was a big hit and was voted the best British film of 1932. Its theme song "Today I Feel So Happy" also became a major hit.

The New York Times though, regretted that the film was "not up to the mark set by the Teutonic work, for the studio acoustics appear to be faulty and in several sequences the director, Victor Saville, has failed to have his scenes as adequately lighted," although the reviewer praised the work of Jack Hulbert and Owen Nares, concluding that "Both give clever performances, the result being that this Gainsborough feature makes for quite a good hour or so of entertainment"; and the Motion Picture Herald praised the film as having "a sparkle in every foot."

References

  1. BFI.org
  2. Wood p.73
  3. Bergfelder & Cargnell p.50
  4. "Sunshine Susie". The Daily News. Perth, WA: National Library of Australia. 19 August 1933. p. 19. Retrieved 4 March 2013.
  5. Shafer p.98
  6. "MOVIE REVIEW Gayety and Melody. - NYTimes.com". The New York Times. 23 March 2023.
  7. Street, Sarah (6 October 2016). Transatlantic Crossings: British Feature Films in the United States. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 9781474290685 – via Google Books.

Other film versions

Bibliography

  • Bergfelder, Tim & Cargnelli, Christian. Destination London: German-speaking emigrés and British cinema, 1925–1950. Berghahn Books, 2008.
  • Shafer, Stephen C. British Popular Films, 1929-1939: The Cinema of Reassurance. Routledge, 1997.
  • Wood, Linda. British Films, 1927–1939. British Film Institute, 1986.

External links

Films directed by Victor Saville
Categories: