Cactus Flower (1969)
Cactus Flower (1969)
DVD5 | ISO+MDS | PAL 16:9 | 01:39:33 | 4,36 Gb
Audio: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish - AC3 2.0 @ 192 Kbps (each track)
Subtitles: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Arabic, Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Finnish,
Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Swedish, Turkish
Genre: Comedy, Romance | Won Oscar | USA
DVD5 | ISO+MDS | PAL 16:9 | 01:39:33 | 4,36 Gb
Audio: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish - AC3 2.0 @ 192 Kbps (each track)
Subtitles: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Arabic, Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Finnish,
Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Swedish, Turkish
Genre: Comedy, Romance | Won Oscar | USA
Goldie Hawn won an Oscar for her performance as a Greenwich Village free spirit in Cactus Flower. Middle-aged dentist Winston (Walter Matthau) is enjoying an affair with Toni (Goldie Hawn) but doesn't want to be hemmed in by marriage. He prevails upon his non-glamorous assistant Stephanie (Ingrid Bergman) to pose as his wife so as to keep from campaigning for a ring. Then, to justify his "infidelity," Winston talks his pal (Jack Weston) into pretending to be Stephanie's illicit lover. Flattered by all the attention, Stephanie begins to "doll up." Confronted by a newly gorgeous Stephanie, Winston realizes that his Dream Girl has been right there in his office all along. As for Toni, she ends up in the arms of a writer (Rick Lenz), who has loved her since Reel One. Cactus Flower was adapted by Billy Wilder's frequent collaborator I.A.L. Diamond from the play by Abe Burrows – which in turn was adapted from a French farce.
IMDB
Cactus Flower (1969), the film version of a Broadway romantic farce, was a personal triumph for its three stars: comic veteran Walter Matthau; dramatic star Ingrid Bergman in a rare comic turn; and television star Goldie Hawn, in her film debut, holding her own with her seasoned co-stars, and winning an Academy Award as Best Supporting Actress. The "cactus flower" of the title is Bergman, as Stephanie, a mousy dental assistant secretly in love with her boss, Matthau, a womanizing bachelor. When the dentist enlists her help to get rid of his much-younger girlfriend, Hawn, by pretending to be his wife, the prickly Stephanie blooms like the proverbial title plant.
Cactus Flower (1969)
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Lauren Bacall had played Stephanie in the 1965 Broadway version of Cactus Flower, earning the kind of critical raves she'd rarely had for her film roles. When the film rights were sold to producer Mike Frankovich, Bacall was confident she'd get the role unless Frankovich wanted someone younger (the character was in her mid-thirties; Bacall was a decade older). Instead, Frankovich offered the part to Ingrid Bergman, who was 54. Bacall was furious, and was very vocal about her disappointment, saying of Bergman, "I hate that woman!"
Cactus Flower (1969)
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Bergman had been living in Europe since the late 1940s, when her scandalous affair with Italian director Roberto Rossellini and the birth of their son out of wedlock ended her Hollywood career. She had made a successful comeback, and won an Oscar® for Anastasia (1956), which was American-produced but made abroad. Since then, Bergman had made several more American-financed films in Europe, and starred onstage in Paris and London. She was divorced from Rossellini, and married to Swedish theatrical producer Lars Schmidt. Bergman had earlier been offered the role of Stephanie in the London stage production of Cactus Flower, but she did not want to be separated from Schmidt. When Frankovich offered her the role in the film, she demurred, feeling she was too old. But Frankovich flew to Paris, looked at her closely, and told her not to worry, she looked fine. Cactus Flower would be her first film made in Hollywood in more than 20 years.
Cactus Flower (1969)
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Even a seasoned pro like Walter Matthau was in awe of Bergman. According to Frankovich, Matthau was worried about whether she'd like him, and how they'd get along. But both Matthau and Goldie Hawn were quickly won over by Bergman's warmth and graciousness. Hawn said in an interview at the time, "I thought I'd be awfully intimidated by her, so intimidated I wouldn't be able to function. It wasn't that way at all. I didn't feel I had to compete. I just felt privileged to be in the same picture with her. She has a regal quality. It's too bad she isn't the queen of some country or something."
Cactus Flower (1969)
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Hawn, who had been playing a ditsy blonde in a bikini in the television comedy show Laugh-In, proved she had plenty of brains and talent behind the dumb-blonde facade. Cactus Flower director Gene Saks was pleasantly surprised at her aplomb. "Never has a girl, in her first film, been so professional." Hawn shrewdly realized that the best way to win over the cantankerous Matthau was by enduring his needling. Hawn always claimed that the Oscar® win was a complete surprise. "I felt you had to work for years and years to win an Academy Award, and I didn't," she said later.
Cactus Flower (1969)
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Hawn's win was no surprise to the critics, who had loved her performance. In New York magazine, Judith Crist called Hawn "an intelligent and sensitive performer." Howard Barnes of the New York Times wrote, "It is the emerging sweetness and perception of this girl's character as an inquisitive Greenwich Village kook, that give the picture its persuasive luster and substance." And Time magazine had praise for all three stars: "Cactus Flower succeeds on the screen thanks to two old masters - and a shiny new one - who have learned that actors get known by the comedy they keep."
Cactus Flower (1969)
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As for Lauren Bacall, she soon got over her disappointment in losing the role of Stephanie by going on to an even bigger stage success in the musical, Applause, which won her a Tony Award. Bergman went to see the play, and afterwards went backstage and knocked on Bacall's dressing room door. When asked by Bacall's assistant who it was, Bergman said, "Tell her the woman she hates more than anyone else in the world wants to see her." According to Bergman, Bacall smiled and greeted her warmly, and "we've been great friends ever since." Both were in the all-star cast of Murder on the Orient Express (1974), which won Bergman another Oscar® as Best Supporting Actress.
Cactus Flower (1969)
Features: Trailer only
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