It's the off-season at the lonely Beauregard Hotel in Bournemoth, and only the long-term tenants are still in residence. Life is stirred up, however, when the beautiful Ann Shankland arrives to see her alcoholic ex-husband, John Malcolm, who is secretly engaged to Pat Cooper, the woman who runs the hotel. Meanwhile, snobbish Mrs Railton-Bell discovers that the kindly if rather doddering Major Pollock, played by David Niven, who won an Oscar for his performance, a retired officer who likes to find out more...

AKA "Meet Whiplash Willie", this film is a real delight with Matthau as a crooked attorney who convinces injured Lemmon to fake partial paralysis in order to claim huge damages. A brilliantly funny veneer covers up a deep-seated cynicism in probably Wilder's finest, though not best known, film.