I'll tell you why so serious

Don't listen to the negative reviews

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

Blistering performances.

While enduring an awful night of shivers then insomnia, I found a movie channel and let it run. In the middle of the night I ended up watching film DARLING LILI for the first time. It is set in the final year of an incredibly sanitized version of The Great War. Andrews plays a famous singer who is actually a patrician version of Mata Hari. She does not seem to do much in the way of actual espionage. Mostly she just passes along to her uncle (Jeremy Crabbe) stray bits of gossip from officers she entertains in her sumptuous mansion. One of them is Rock Hudson. They have zero charisma together and he looks like he just walked thru the part. Heck, he does not even appear into the film for quite a while. The film must have cost a fortune, even for big budget musicals of the time. Several times we see Lili performing to a packed opera house. That's a helluva lot of extras in period costumes. Throw in a Hallmark Channel version of THE BLUE MAX. Gotta give Hudson something to do. Julie Andrews' voice was at the top of her game. Honestly she and Blake would have been better served just doing a concert film. One thing to note is that Andrews and her husband/director Blake Edwards were chaffing at Andrew's usual screen persona, a mix of Mary Poppins, Maria von Trapp, and Emily. In all but one of her performances Lili wears incredible gowns. But when she learns her lover (Hudson) has been seeing a stripper, Lili decides to do a striptease number. Oh, and the film earned some salacious publicity at the time because Andrews did a topless scene. Nothing was visible on US screens of course. But there was always "the European version." Did I mention she and Hudson had zero charisma together? The film was Ms Andrew's first bomb, although not as bad as her next project STAR.

This film is an unstructured ragbag which is not a musical, nor a romantic comedy, nor a spy thriller, nor a war movie, nor a spoof, nor a slapstick comedy, although it does try to be all of these, mostly sequentially but sometimes, Lord help us, simultaneously. Miss Andrews' acting abilities are untaxed by the weak script, and she spends much of the overlong time of the film singing songs which would not be out of place in "Mary Poppins." The aerial sequences are obviously expensive but unexciting. The film is a work which shrieks self-indulgence and lack of discipline, which, alas, is so often the case when the credits read "Produced, written, AND directed by . . ."

Not a great film, but it did garner three Oscar nominations: Best Costume Design for Donald Brooks and Jack Bear; Best Song, "Whistling Away the Dark" with music by Henry Mancini and lyrics by Johnny Mercer and Best Score by the same two. Of course, The Beatles beat them out for son score with "Let It Be." Julie Andrews as the spy was terrific, and Rock Hudson as the WWI flyer was equally good. They were supported ably by Jeremy Kemp as her handler.It was funny and romantic and one of the most delightful films of the period.

Julie Andrews satirically prods her own goody-two-shoes image in this overproduced, uneven musical comedy-drama; but, if Andrews approaches her role with aplomb, she's nearly alone in doing so. Blake Edwards' film about a woman who is both music-hall entertainer and German spy during WWI doesn't know what tone to aim for, and Rock Hudson has the thankless task of playing romantic second-fiddle. Musicals had grown out of favor by 1970, and elephantine productions like "Star!" and this film really tarnished Andrews' reputation, leaving a lot of dead space in her catalogue until "The Tamarind Seed" came along. I've always thought Julie Andrews would've made a great villain or shady lady; her strong voice could really command attention, and she hits some low notes that can either be imposing or seductive. Husband/director Edwards seems to realize this, but neither he nor Julie can work up much energy within this scenario. Screenwriter William Peter Blatty isn't a good partner for Edwards, and neither man has his heart in this material. Beatty's script offers Andrews just one fabulous sequence: a raucous striptease--though this is done in nudging satire, so we in the audience will understand it's all a put-on. A cop-out is more like it. ** from ****