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Film: Ninotchka

"A Russian! I love Russians! Comrade, I've been fascinated by your five-year plan for the last fifteen years."

"The last mass trials have been a great success. There are going to be fewer but better Russians."

— Ninotchka

Ninotchka is a 1939 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Romantic Comedy, directed by legendary director Ernst Lubitsch, co-written by Billy Wilder and starring Greta Garbo and Melvyn Douglas, set in interbellum Paris and Moscow.

Three bungling Soviet diplomats aim to sell some Romanov diamonds to a Parisian jeweller to raise funds for the Soviet Union. Nina Ivanovna Yakushova, nicknamed "Ninotchka" (Garbo), an Ice Queen diplomat, is sent over to help them after they make a mess of it, where she meets and falls in love with Parisian boulevardier and aristocrat Leon d'Algout (Douglas). In this she finds herself rivaled by the diamonds' original owner, the Grand Duchess Swana (Ina Claire), who wishes to retrieve both the jewels and Leon's affections. Swana manipulates Ninotchka into abandoning Leon in order to keep the jewels for Russia. Leon, however, does not accept the situation...

The story was later remade as the musical Silk Stockings, with music by Cole Porter, which was itself adapted into a 1957 MGM film with Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse in the Douglas and Garbo parts, respectively.

Tropes include:

Bad Boss: Komissar Razinin is feared by pretty much all of his underlings, as he has the power to order deportations to Siberia.
Blonde Communist Sex Kitten
Character Development: Ninotchka and Leon change each other.
Character Title
Defrosting Ice Queen: Ninotchka.
Gay Paree
The Hedonist: Leon, in the beginning.
Ladykiller In Love
Lzherusskie: Ninotchka is played by Greta Garbo, who was Swedish. The actors playing the three diplomats were German. Bela Lugosi (who played the commissar) was Hungarian.
No Sense of Humor: Leon attempts to make Ninotchka laugh by telling her jokes, to absolutely no effect. Then she sees him fall on his ass, and...
Playing Against Type: Garbo Laughs!
- It's also one of the very few non-horror films Lugosi appeared in (though he's still pretty scary).
Shout Out: In the form of a direct repudiation of Garbo's Signature Line from her earlier hit, Grand Hotel:
Iranoff: Do you want to be alone, comrade?
Ninotchka: No.
- Double Subverted, though, when she later tells Leon's butler: "Go to bed, Little Father — we want to be alone."
"Shut Up" Kiss: Played with: Leon gives a long speech about love, and Ninotchka replies, "You're very talkative." Except he's the one who plants one on her right after that. However, it's played straight when he's about to give another long speech about love a few seconds later, and she stops him by kissing him.
The Spock: Ninotchka, in the beginning.
Uptight Loves Wild, with a genderflip from the usual pattern.