I wasn't aware of this movie when it was initially released and probably didn't see it for several years after it came out when I saw it on TV. This is a bright, witty charming movie loaded with a talented cast in James Garner, Dick Van Dyke, Angie Dickenson, Elke Sommer, Ethel Merman, Carl Reiner and a lot of great character actors. I've only seen this a few times as it doesn't seem to get much air time on TV and I don't know why because this is a funny movie. Norma Jewison directs this forgotten gem. It's a good escapist romantic comedy and gives Van Dyke a lot of room to display his comedic skills. James Garner hold the whole thing together. If it shows up on TV again sometime try to check it out, some good comedy situations here. I would give this an 8 on a scale of 10 and recommend it.

In 1938 Rene Clair directed a movie called BREAK THE NEWS where Maurice Chevalier and Jack Buchanan are in the shadow of an egotistical female star, and stage Buchanan's disappearance, and possible murder by Chevalier to build up publicity for both men - only to have the scheme blow up in their faces when Buchanan gets arrested on a capital charge himself, and is prevented from showing up in court to rescue Chevalier. Both men are almost executed - but saved at the last moment by the egotistical star who learns the truth. So she gathers all the good publicity in the end.

There is also a short story by Mark Twain entitled "IS HE DEAD?" about a plot to make a reputation for a prominent 19th Century artist, Gustave Courbet, by him pretending to be dead, and his paintings being sold for larger and larger amounts of cash so that the still living Courbet and his friends make a huge profit.

Those are possible keys to the plot genesis of THE ART OF LOVE, a 1965 film that starred James Garner, Dick Van Dyke, Elke Sommer, Angie Dickenson, and Ethel Merman. There are some interesting supporting roles for Carl Reiner and Roger C. Carmel, as a French defense counsel and a questionable art dealer too. Garner gets the idea that Van Dyke's paintings are quite good, but would sell for more money if he was to be thought to be dead. Garner announces that Van Dyke has disappeared, and is believed to have committed suicide. But the janitor (Jay Novello) has seen Garner disposing of a dummy. Novello sees the legs being put into the furnace, and thinks it could have been a body.

Van Dyke's existence is known to only two people: Elke Sommer (his girlfriend) and Ethel Merman, his landlady. He has to keep a low profile, dressing in disguise all the time. And he notices that Garner is living in luxury from the sale of the paintings by Roger Carmel (an art dealer who may have collaborated with the Nazis). Angered at the lack of interest by Garner, and the latter's opportunistic romancing of his former girlfriend Angie Dickinson, Van Dyke suddenly realizes that Garner has left himself open for suspicion of the "murder" of Van Dyke.

So Van Dyke carefully sets up "evidence" of his murder by Garner, complete with bloodstained clothing and broken teeth (and Novello's witnessing of the incident with the furnace). Motive is there - Garner is benefiting from his dead friend's paintings, and he has taken the dead man's girlfriend. So Garner is arrested (as is Carmel, who is soon willing to assist the prosecution). And Van Dyke, in disguise, watches the criminal trial with glee. Reiner, Garner's lawyer, is more concerned with not being associated too much with Garner than with defending him.

The end is a race to the guillotine, complete with a clone of Madame Defarge, and Marcel Hillaire as the public executioner who abhors the death penalty.

It is a moderately entertaining comedy, with some funny moments. You will never hear the words "Don't touch!" again without thinking of Reiner's attorney. Not a great film, but good enough for a rainy afternoon.

The separate talents of James Garner and Dick Van Dyke should have guaranteed a better film than The Art Of Love. Still the considerable legion of fans both those guys have should be pleased. Not to mention that Angie Dickinson and Elke Sommer are along for the girl watchers.

The guys are roommates in a Paris flat Garner an aspiring writer and Van Dyke an aspiring painter, neither of whom has made their mark. But in Van Dyke's case as is pointed out painters only become legends after their demise.

Which while both are in a drunken stupor gives Garner a brilliant idea, especially when Van Dyke jumps into the Seine. He sells whatever he can find for a bundle and then when Van Dyke shows up they keep the fiction going. After that romantic complications set in and other kinds of complications set in as the gag goes way too far.

I really expected better. Garner's charming conman gets a bit hard to take. Van Dyke's gift for physical comedy and pantomime are served better in The Act Of Love. Ethel Merman has a part as a brothel madam and she's about as French as Anna May Wong. And what were a husband and wife pair of Jewish Delicatessen owners Irving Jacobson and Naomi Stevens doing here. More suggestive of Flatbush than the Left Bank.

Not the best work for any of the quartet of stars.