"Gigi" is undoubtedly as good as it is because it was a musical written expressly for the screen (it had been an enormously popular Broadway play starring Audrey Hepburn). Lerner and Loewe were coming off their huge success with "My Fair Lady" on Broadway, and were at the height of their powers when they created the classic songs and screenplay for this film. And although Leslie Caron's vocals were dubbed (thankfully not by Marni Nixon), the rest of the cast acquits themselves with aplomb and a good deal of style, particularly the heartstoppingly suave and beautiful Louis Jourdan (who was much older than he looked at the time, as was Caron -- he was 38, she was 27). The breathtaking Art Nouveau sets and fin de siecle costumes were all designed by Cecil Beaton and are even more gorgeous than those he did for the film version of "My Fair Lady" a few years later.
This film is very faithful to Colette's original short story in both humor and spirit, and while I have no illusions that it is a completely truthful portrait of life in early 20th century Paris, it is a delightful, romantic story, one that is as lovely now as it was in the 1950s, or indeed, at the turn of the century. It really did deserve the Best Picture Oscar.
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