This is another of the four Noel Coward-David Lean joint ventures. As I look though David Lean's DIRECTORAL filmography, I see that his career began with these Coward joint ventures, passed though a brief Dickens phase, ran through drama and romance period, and ended with those huge multi-award winning epics like: Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Doctor Zhivago (1965), Ryan's Daughter (1970), and A Passage to India (1984). In any case, I am determined to watch as many of his 18 movies as I can. Although Blithe Spirit was one of Coward's favorite plays, it is far from anything I would expect from Lean. It's probably his main mad cap comedy, in that it is notable for its silliness. It is 'the British version of the Topper movies, with live people forced to interact with playful ghosts from their past.
As the movie begins, mystery writer, Charles Condomine (Rex Harrison), and his wife, Ruth (Constance Cummings)—both previously married and widowed--are holding a party with friends. At the party, Charlie plans to do research (on the tricks of phony psychics) for his next novel. In this case, they hire the local soothsayer, Madame Arcati (Margaret Rutherford). Madam Arcati is an excited devotee of paranormal arts and practices. However, she is also a novice of her given trade. When the group holds a seance that evening, Arcati gets her incantations mixed up and brings back the spirit of Charlie's dead wife, Elvira (Kay Hammond). As in a Topper movie, only Charlie can see Elvira's ghost, and he looks like a fool to everyone else as he talks and interacts with her while she remains invisible to them.
As the story progresses, Charlie, Ruth, and Elvira's spirit all become upset. Ruth doesn't understand what's going on; Elvira really doesn't want to be there as a ghost; and the mix up of living with two wives—in two different psychic spheres at the same time--frustrates Charlie. Elvira finally gets her revenge on Ruth by killing her in a car accident. NOW the problem becomes that both wives are dead but neither of their ghosts has left Charlie 'to pass over to the other side.' Worst of all, getting rid of these apparitions can only be done with the help of the totally incompetent Madame Arcati. Though she enthusiastically accepts the challenge of getting rid of the ghosts; all of her chants, incantations, and textbook research on paranormal phenomena comically fail her. The plot may seem a bit hackneyed today, but with Rutherford's performance, anything old becomes totally new and refreshing again!!
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In summer 1941, Noel Coward's "Blithe Spirit" opened on the London stage, with Coward himself directing. Appearing as Madame Arcati, the genuine psychic, was Margaret Rutherford, in a role in which Coward had earlier envisaged her and which he then especially shaped for her. Later, Rutherford would carry her portrayal of Madame Arcati to the screen adaptation, David Lean's Blithe Spirit (1945). And not only would this become one of Rutherford's most memorable screen performances - with her bicycling about the Kentish countryside, cape fluttering behind her - but as well, it would establish the model for portraying that pseudo-soothsayer forever thereafter. (As Noel Coward had Margaret Rutherford in mind for his Madame Arcati creation, so, it is said, did Agatha Christie have Margaret Rutherford in mind for hers of Miss Marple.) Despite Dame Margaret Rutherford's appearances in more than 40 films, it is as Madame Arcati and as Miss Jane Marple that she will best be remembered.--- From IMDb's Mino Bio for Margaret Rutherford.
As the movie begins, mystery writer, Charles Condomine (Rex Harrison), and his wife, Ruth (Constance Cummings)—both previously married and widowed--are holding a party with friends. At the party, Charlie plans to do research (on the tricks of phony psychics) for his next novel. In this case, they hire the local soothsayer, Madame Arcati (Margaret Rutherford). Madam Arcati is an excited devotee of paranormal arts and practices. However, she is also a novice of her given trade. When the group holds a seance that evening, Arcati gets her incantations mixed up and brings back the spirit of Charlie's dead wife, Elvira (Kay Hammond). As in a Topper movie, only Charlie can see Elvira's ghost, and he looks like a fool to everyone else as he talks and interacts with her while she remains invisible to them.
As the story progresses, Charlie, Ruth, and Elvira's spirit all become upset. Ruth doesn't understand what's going on; Elvira really doesn't want to be there as a ghost; and the mix up of living with two wives—in two different psychic spheres at the same time--frustrates Charlie. Elvira finally gets her revenge on Ruth by killing her in a car accident. NOW the problem becomes that both wives are dead but neither of their ghosts has left Charlie 'to pass over to the other side.' Worst of all, getting rid of these apparitions can only be done with the help of the totally incompetent Madame Arcati. Though she enthusiastically accepts the challenge of getting rid of the ghosts; all of her chants, incantations, and textbook research on paranormal phenomena comically fail her. The plot may seem a bit hackneyed today, but with Rutherford's performance, anything old becomes totally new and refreshing again!!
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In summer 1941, Noel Coward's "Blithe Spirit" opened on the London stage, with Coward himself directing. Appearing as Madame Arcati, the genuine psychic, was Margaret Rutherford, in a role in which Coward had earlier envisaged her and which he then especially shaped for her. Later, Rutherford would carry her portrayal of Madame Arcati to the screen adaptation, David Lean's Blithe Spirit (1945). And not only would this become one of Rutherford's most memorable screen performances - with her bicycling about the Kentish countryside, cape fluttering behind her - but as well, it would establish the model for portraying that pseudo-soothsayer forever thereafter. (As Noel Coward had Margaret Rutherford in mind for his Madame Arcati creation, so, it is said, did Agatha Christie have Margaret Rutherford in mind for hers of Miss Marple.) Despite Dame Margaret Rutherford's appearances in more than 40 films, it is as Madame Arcati and as Miss Jane Marple that she will best be remembered.--- From IMDb's Mino Bio for Margaret Rutherford.