Charade (1963)

	Directed by: Stanley Donen	COUNTRY USA GENRE Romantic screwball comedy / Mystery NORWEGIAN TITLE Charade – hvem svindler hvem? RUNNING TIME 113 minutes
	Produced by: Stanley Donen
	Written by: Peter Stone

Cast includes:
CHARACTER	ACTOR/ACTRESS	RATING
Brian Cruikshank	Cary Grant
Regina "Reggie" Lampert	Audrey Hepburn
Carson Dyle	Walter Matthau
Tex Panthollow	James Coburn	½
Herman Scobie	George Kennedy	½
Sylvie Gaudel	Dominique Minot	-
Leopold W. Gideon	Ned Glass
Inspector Edoard Grandpierre	Jacques Marin	½
Mr. Felix	Paul Bonifas	-
Jean-Louis	Thomas Chelimsky	-

Review

At first glance, you may feel that Charade is an early James Bond rip-off, or that the considerable age difference between Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn in the romantic leads will be icky, but soon the film's delightful confidence and carefree attitude sweep such qualms aside and take you on a fun and clever mystery adventure in and around Paris. The complications are rather elegantly laid out, and the film dances effortlessly between lighthearted romantic comedy and semi-Hitchcockesque thriller – it's like To Catch a Thief with an added layer of zest and self-reference. Director Stanley Donen (Singing in the Rain) operates with a tight, but never suffocating control. Still, his biggest achievement is how he creates a fertile environment for Grant and Hepburn's talents to shine through and make their unbelievable romance believable. It was Grant's final role as a romantic lead, and it's almost as if he laid the entire Golden Age era to rest with it.