Wealthy American widow Elizabeth Carter plans to marry the Earl of Dettminster when lawyer Augustus Tucker informs her of a codicil in her late husband's will. The Carter fortune will go to nephew Pitney Carter, who is in love with Elizabeth, if her second husband is not an American. Elizabeth therefore pays penniless playwright Jasper Mallory $50,000 to marry her and schemes with actress Mme. Albani to provide grounds for divorce so that she may then make the earl her third husband.
Dowdy Sylvia accepts her boss' marriage proposal, even though he only asked her to avoid marriage to another woman. As a wealthy wife, Sylvia changes from ugly duckling to uninhibited swan and even contemplates having an affair with a man she meets during a trip to Paris.
A sportswriter jilted by his globe-trotting girlfriend marries a woman jilted by her boyfriend.
One woman faces many trials on the road to romance after unwittingly marrying a bigamist, then a carnival's barker and then falling for a young engineer.
When a boss proposes marriage to his secretary, she discovers that the arrangement is solely for tax purposes.
To stop Pinkie's widowed, struggling mother Dottie from marrying a well-off older man they know she doesn't love, teenager Pinkie and her best friend Buzz kidnap her in the family travel trailer to live a carefree life on the open road. They then get the idea to find Dottie a financially secure husband whom both she and Pinkie would like.
A self-made success is determined to give his son the lavish upbringing he himself was denied. Not surprisingly, the son grows up to be spoiled rotten, causing grief and pain to everyone who loves him.
Ad man Stephen Dexter asks his secretary Kendall to marry him as a loophole in order to protect his finances during an important business deal. Once the deal is completed, he asks Kendall for a divorce and is dismayed when she refuses.
Seeking US citizenship, a Viennese refugee arranges a marriage of convenience with a struggling writer.
After marrying a dour and disinterested lord for status, a young woman falls in love with a stage actor while her best friend from boarding school enters an affair with her husband.
The local building-contractor Martin Roumagnac is fascinated by the fashionable Blanche Ferrand. To impress Blache, Martin presents her with a villa. However, this ruins him financially. Despite Martin's many efforts for the now femme-fatal Blanche, she is not able to chose between him and the rich consul De Laubry.
Two men and a woman form a triangle confined by a lighthouse.
Soames and Irene Forsyte have a marriage of convenience. Young Jolyon Forsyte is a black sheep who ran away with the maid after his wife's death. Teenager June Forsyte has found love with an artist, Phillip Bosinny. The interactions between the Forsytes and the people and society around them is the truss for this love story set in the rigid and strict times of the Victorian age.
After the end of WWII, a young Lithuanian woman and a young Italian man from Stromboli impulsively marry, but married life on the island is more demanding than she can accept.
Henry Hobson owns and tyrannically runs a successful Victorian boot maker’s shop in Salford, England. A stingy widower with a weakness for overindulging in the local Moonraker Public House, he exploits his three daughters as cheap labour. When he declares that there will be ‘no marriages’ to avoid the expense of marriage settlements at £500 each, his eldest daughter Maggie rebels.
Airy comedy of a man a woman and the lengths they'll go to for a really great apartment! Located in the center of Rome with amazing views both want it and strike the compromise of marrying each other platonically to get it. The woman still hopes for true love and the man agrees to step aside should that special someone come along but he is secretly smitten with her and surreptitiously makes her various suitors look like fools. All goes well until he comes up against Rosanno Brazzi and finds him a tough challenge to overcome.
Lucas Marsh, an intern bent upon becoming a first-class doctor, not merely a successful one. He courts and marries the warm-hearted Kristina, not out of love but because she is highly knowledgeable in the skills of the operating room and because she has frugally put aside her savings through the years. She will be, as he shrewdly knows, a supportive wife in every way. She helps make him the success he wants to be and cheerfully moves with him to the small town in which he starts his practice. But as much as he tries to be a good husband to the undemanding Kristina, Marsh easily falls into the arms of a local siren and the patience of the long-sorrowing Kristina wears thin.
Veronika and Boris come together in Moscow shortly before World War II. Walking along the river, they watch cranes fly overhead, and promise to rendezvous before Boris leaves to fight. Boris misses the meeting and is off to the front lines, while Veronika waits patiently, sending letters faithfully. After her house is bombed, Veronika moves in with Boris' family, into the company of a cousin with his own intentions.
A woman who believes she has been chosen by God to heal people is taken in by a greedy promoter and his shrewish wife to make the rounds of the rural South.
A girl on the road to stardom fights the dehumanizing effects of Hollywood life.