Pygmalion

Nominated for Best Actor (Leslie Howard), Best Actress (Wendy Hiller), Outstanding Production, and Screenplay Writing in 1938.

Until a few years ago, I totally thought this was an interpretation of some obscure Greek myth.  You guys - it's totally "My Fair Lady"!  The Rex Harrison film was based on this one, which was in turn based on a George Bernard Shaw play of the same name.  We see the story of Eliza, a flower girl, and Henry, a prick.  Henry is a hot shot diction teacher (because apparently that was a thing?) who makes a bet with his friend that he can turn Eliza the Gutter Rat into Lady Eliza that can Pass for a Duchess within six months.  He succeeds so swimmingly that not only does Eliza pass for a duchess, she's so mysterious and lovely that she is assumed to be a princess.

The sets and costumes were completely gorgeous here.  Particularly Eliza's ball gown, which is a gown that I can see any woman clamoring for today - it is exemplary of the fashion of the day but still completely stylish and royal.

This film is placed into the romantic genre, and as of many of its ilk I have a problem with the romance bit.  The movie was a treat to watch, but fell to a lack of romance.  We only learn that our main characters have feelings for one another well into the third act, and even then the emotions seemed like what the characters should feel, rather than what they choose to feel.  "Welp.  I'm here, and you're here, and we've put all this time into this thing, so we should probably . . . yeah?"  No sweeping off feet, no flirtation.  One could argue that there is passion in the arguments they fling, but romance?  I didn't feel it.

It's astounding to see the way that cinema changed in only one short year.  This was released in 1938, only one year before movies like "The Wizard of Oz" and "Gone with the Wind."  This movie seems almost primitive compared to those epics but it only detracts from the charm at the beginning, and then I became accustomed to the shaky camera work and painted landscapes.