Holiday Buying Guide 2008

Talkies were barely a year old when Ernst Lubitsch, the German emigré director, perfected the movie musical. That was The Love Parade (1929), with Maurice Chevalier as an ooh-la-la commoner and Jeanette MacDonald as the queen he marries. The four musicals in this collection, including Monte Carlo, The Smiling Lieutenant and One Hour With You) fairly brim with cinematic brio, adultery plots and such effervescent hits as "Beyond the Blue Horizon." Forced to pick a favorite, we'd settle on One Hour With You, in which the two stars play that oddest of movie teams: a married couple in love. But her best friend (Genevieve Tobin) is in love with him, and his best friend (Charlie Ruggles) is in love with her. Being not just a man but a Frenchman, Chevalier accepts a little of Tobin's affection. As he addresses the men in the movie audience: "Do you think you could resist her? / Do you think you wouldn't have kissed her? / Would you treat her like a sister? / Come on, be honest, Mister!... Now I ask you what would you do? / Hey, that's what I did too." Do yourself a favor and buy this four-disc magnum of Champagne.

—Richard Corliss