Product Description

A young woman on the verge of marriage departs for a whirlwind guided tour of 9 countries in 18 days. The group she meets helps her decide if she should commit to the middle class life she's headed for or make a life-changing commitment to freedom and fun!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #13845 in DVD
• Brand: MGM HOME VIDEO (UNDER FOX)
• Released on: 2008-05-20
• Rating: G (General Audience)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish
• Dubbed in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 98 minutes

Features

• A young woman on the verge of marriage departs for a whirlwind guided tour of 9 countries in 18 days. The group she meets helps her decide if she should commit to the middle life she's headed for or make a life-changing commitment to freedom and fun! Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: COMEDY Rating: G Age: 883904106753 UPC: 883904106753 Manufacturer No: M110675

Amazon.com
Suzanne Pleshette, who never got the career she deserved, achieved TV success as the skeptical wife on The Bob Newhart Show, but If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium--a 1969 comedy about tourists on a speed tour of Europe--shows off the movie star that Pleshette could have been. The movie sounds like an excuse for a lot of cheap gags, and there are plenty of broad jokes, but they're balanced by sly satirical bits that cut both ways (the vulgar Americans and the cynical Europeans get equally mocked). Even more unexpected are moments of lyricism, cross-cultural generosity, and bittersweetness, such as when a veteran finally re-meets the Italian woman he's been holding a torch for since World War II. These swift but skillful vignettes get fleshed out by a great crew of late-60s character actors and comedians. Holding the episodes together is the ongoing flirtation between Pleshette's no-nonsense Minnesota businesswoman and the wily British tour guide played by Ian McShane (fans of Deadwood will gape in astonishment at his boyish youth). McShane is shamelessly charming, but Pleshette is ravishing, both sensible and drop-dead sexy. The combination sounds improbable, but when she's standing on a balcony, drowsily surveying Rome in the morning light, and wearing nothing but a man's shirt, Pleshette fuses what-the-hell pleasure with the knowledge that, sometimes, things just don't work out. She's heartbreaking and resilient; this woman should have been a star. If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium is a deeply enjoyable movie with a unique combination of humor and humanity that holds up remarkably well. --Bret Fetzer

Customer Reviews

Madcap! Zany!! Very Enjoyable!
9 countries in 18 days is responsible from lines such as "I think I was born on this bus"...to which a reply came "I think I died on this bus." It's a riot, with some great comedic stars of the 60's. The core of the story is Yank Suzanne Plushette (with wigs that make her hair look like it grows a years growth in those 18 days!!) is woman on the verge of committing to marriage, and not really thrilled about it, so she joins a tour bus to see Europe. Charlie (Ian McShane) is the womanising tour guide, who marks her for a good time, but their relationship grows to the point Susan must decide whether to stop being the middle class Yank with the boring, but safe middle class marriage ahead of her, or to toss it all to the wind for Charlie and his life of little substance, but one that is exciting. You have family with daughter who has found 'boys!!', a man and wife who end up on separate buses and keep missing each other, a WWII vet visiting the site of his former battles, a man wanting an expensive pair of Italian shoes for cheap price, another visiting his long lost relatives, another who is stealing 'souvenirs' from every hotel to where he cannot lift their luggage, but never speaks, and one put upon husband who keeps threatening his wife 'I'm an going to get you for this'.

Its a great fun movie, that you will watch again and again.

Still Funny...after all of these years!
Besides being an author, I am also a professional tour director. So this movie is especially funny and interesting as both a tourist and as a tour director.

Today as in 1969, American still go on packaged group tours. And I've also led group tours in America for Europeans. What happens on these tours is a lot like the movie....going to all the tourist highlights, getting lost, culture/customs misunderstandings, hotel disappointments, etc. Whatever could go wrong eventually does go wrong.

I like this movie so much that I bring it along on my longer tours to watch. In the group tour business, this is a hilarious classic.

If It's Tuesday...This Must be a Great Film
A forgotten comic gem that's very understated and low key. A satire on European vacation packaged tours, IF IT'S TUESDAY, THIS MUST BE BELGIUM is almost a precursor to tv shows like the LOVE BOAT as groups and/or individuals meet and then go off on their separate (mis)adventures. As stated, the comedy is very low key and understated, and the characters and individual adventures are very funny with Susan Pleshette and Ian McShane in lead roles as tourist and tour guide respectively on a european bus tour. The most memorable sequence is, of course, when a WWII vet Mike Harmon (Micheal Constantine -MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING) is reminiscing at a battlefield site memorial with one of the women passengers, of the battle confrontation. At the same time, a German tourist with his wife is reminiscing the same confrontation. The two pass each other simultaneously making machine gun fire noises. However, one of the funniest sequences is with tourist John Marina (Sandy Baron - Mr.Klompus on SEINFELD). While in Venice, he visits distant relatives and winds up on a receiving end of a shotgun wedding with a girl he doesn't even know. He escapes out a bathroom window and jumps into the Venice canals for a narrow escape. Other cast members include Norman Fell (THREE'S COMPANY), Murray Hamilton (THE GRADUATE, JAWS), Marty Ingalls,Peggy Cass,and cameos with the likes of John Cassevetes, Robert Vaughan,Joan Collins,and 60's pop star, Donovan. Overall, very entertaining and fun.