The Millionairess (1960)

After shedding a husband (Gary Raymond), a spoiled heiress (Sophia Loren) turns her attention to an impoverished Indian doctor (Peter Sellers) in a poverty stricken area of London. But he has no interest in her or her money but she is determined that he is to be her next husband and what she wants, she gets. Based on the play by George Bernard Shaw and directed by Anthony Asquith. Asquith would seem the ideal director for a film version of THE MILLIONAIRESS as he directed one of the best adaptations of a Shaw play into film, PYGMALION (1938). But the movie is a travesty of the Shaw play. Sophia Loren looks fantastic in her haute couture Pierre Balmain wardrobe but she's miscast here. She's too passionate for Shaw's haughty ice queen. Peter Sellers is supposed to be Egyptian but he plays it as an Indian so he can do his patented Indian schtick (he'd return to it eight years later with more success in THE PARTY). All the wit from Shaw's play is gone and replaced with dull comedic bits and characterizations. Not even's Loren's considerable star presence can hold our interest after awhile. With Vittorio De Sica, Alistair Sim, Dennis Price, Alfie Bass, Miriam Karlin, Eleanor Summerfield and Noel Purcell.