The Shop Around the Corner

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One of the most charming and romantic films around, this 1940 comic romance finds James Stewart (Vertigo, It's A Wonderful Life) working in a small shop in Budapest and longing for a girl to call his own. His coworker, Margaret Sullavan, feels the same, and soon they are both corresponding and falling in love with their respective pen pals. What they don't realize is that they are writing to and falling in love with each other, but the problem is that they can't stand each other in person. The beguiling nature of the mistaken identity formula that influenced countless films is done to perfection here, and the wry combativeness and delightful banter between the two leads makes this a very special film. --Robert Lane

Customer Reviews:

The Shop Around the Corner.......2007-06-25

They don't make romantic comedies like they used to, and no one made them quite like director Ernst Lubitsch, whose famed "touch" lights this wry, poignant, perennially charming film. Veteran players Stewart and Sullavan are a perfect match as comically antagonistic lonelyhearts, conveying their characters' vulnerabilities with a delicacy too often missing from the tepid Hanks-Ryan remake, "You've Got Mail". Rich subplots involving the wonderful Frank Morgan and Joseph Schildkraut, who plays a scheming, boastful employee, let Lubitsch impart further nuance to this modest but wholly pleasing tale. A delight from start to finish, this is one "Shop" you'll want to dally in.

Give me a Stamp!!.......2007-06-09

Does anyone write letters in more. What a shame. Oh, if it could be so easy. This was a great film I loved every minute of it. Sullavan and Stewart were so good together. I wasn't sure I would like the Budapest being the backdrop but it turn out that it didn't bother me. Great movie to add to anyones collection. I know that I'm glad that its in mine..

You've got mail, take one.......2007-04-21

In Ernst Lubitch's delightful romantic comedy, James Stewart's and Margaret Sullivan's third film together, Stewart plays Alfred Kralick, the best and most experienced employee of Matuschek & Co, a gift shop in Budapest, Hungary. He is in love with a woman with whom he's been anonymously corresponding, found her his soul mate, admires her intelligence, and sense of humor, and is ready to meet her in flesh (very much like now days people meet, communicate, and fell in love on line before they meet in real life . One morning Klara Novak walks into the store desperately in the need for a job. First, Kralick and Klara don't get along but we understand that they actually attract to each other. Klara also corresponds with a man whom she's never met but felt that he is the right man for her. Would Klara and Alfred meet with their mysterious correspondents or would they ever look closer at each other? Watch this story of love first unrecognized but inevitable directed by the one of the wittiest masters of comedy, Ernst Lubitch.

4.5

People Will Talk.......2007-03-27

Excellent movie! One of James Stewart's best ones. It was better then the remake "You've Got Mail."

Beautifully shot, and a fun story, too.......2007-02-20

I first saw this movie on satellite TV with my mom one winter vacation. Recently, I was reminded of it, and remembered how wonderful it is. Besides being an adorable story, the film is shot beautifully in black and white, which the DVD shows off perfectly. I think it's much better than You've Got Mail, although I like that movie, too. Definitely worth at least a rental.

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