Irma la Douce

An honest Paris policeman raids the prostitutes on his own beat, loses his job, and ends up as Irma's protector. Then jealousy makes him invent a fake English lord who will be her only client, and he starts working day and night to finance the deception. Billy Wilder reunited Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine after The Apartment. The part had originally been considered for Marilyn Monroe, and her death in 1962 changed the plan. The most striking decision is formal. The film comes from a 1956 French stage musical, and Wilder removed every song, making a film adapted from a musical that is not a musical. André Previn won the Academy Award for Best Original Score and MacLaine took the Golden Globe. On a 5 million dollar budget it grossed 25.2 million domestically and finished as the fifth highest-grossing film of 1963. In the Netherlands it became the most attended film of all time with 3.6 million admissions. Who it is for: people who enjoy Wilder pushing at the limits of what a comedy could say. Who it is not for: anyone who cannot watch sex work presented as entirely charming, which is exactly what this film does.