Caprice is a 1967 DeLuxe Color comedy-thriller film directed by Frank Tashlin starring Doris Day and Richard Harris. It was Day's second and last film with Tashlin, after the previous year's The Glass Bottom Boat. This film and In Like Flint (1967) were the last movies made in CinemaScope, with most studios moving to Panavision and other widescreen processes.
Plot
Patricia Foster, an industrial designer for Femina Cosmetics, owned by Sir Jason Fox, is arrested for trying to sell a secret formula to a rival company, May Fortune, owned by Matthew Cutter. After her release and her firing from Femina, Patricia is hired by Cutter. All of this is actually a scheme devised by Sir Jason for Patricia to steal the formula for a new water-repellent hairspray, invented by Dr Stuart Clancy, May Fortune's head chemist.
Christopher White, Cutter's right-hand man, convinces Patricia that he, too, secretly works for Sir Jason. Christopher eventually learns Patricia Foster is not her actual name.
Patricia goes to the apartment of Su Ling, Clancy's secretary, and finds her unconscious on the floor. She takes a sample of the powder lying on her table for Sir Jason to have it analyzed. Patricia also finds a bottle of the hairspray and takes it with her. Christopher catches her, threatening her with telling Sir Jason that her real name is Felippa Fowler.
Patricia reveals she is the daughter of Robert Fowler, a man who was murdered while on the trail of a narcotics ring. According to him, the head of the ring was a woman, most probably his murderer. Although finding her father's killer is her main objective, Patricia is still devoted to Sir Jason, to whom she plans to give the hairspray. Purposely breaking the bottle upon hearing this news – but noticing that it is an expensive Swiss one not used by Cutter – Christopher says Clancy has Swiss connections – he is married to a Swiss woman still living in Switzerland.
Patricia goes to Switzerland and finds Madame Piasco – Clancy's mother-in-law – who is the actual expert who had long ago come up with the formula. She gives a bottle to Patricia for free, stating that May Fortune now has the distribution rights and it will soon be on the market in America.
Patricia goes skiing on the same hill where her father died and comes under fire from a masked skier. Arriving in a helicopter, Christopher rescues her. Patricia eventually realizes that neither Christopher nor Sir Jason were ever after the hairspray. Clancy used to be the chief cosmetics chemist for Sir Jason but was an utter failure at it, and Sir Jason's true goal was to discover and hire the chemical mastermind behind Clancy, whose identity he still does not know. Regardless, Patricia plans to give the hairspray solely to Sir Jason, which was her agreed mission. Christopher and Patricia profess their love for each other, but he requests one more job from her concerning Sir Jason.
Later, Christopher secretly records Patricia while she speaks to Clancy. She offers Clancy a job as Femina's head chemist, with an illegal under-the-table bonus. Clancy declines, saying Cutter already knows about Madame Piasco, and if Cutter does not care, he is happy where he is. At his office, Cutter watches the film of this encounter. He tells Christopher that this footage will ruin Sir Jason.
Patricia visits Sir Jason, who tells her he convinced Madame Piasco to come and work for him. Patricia finds this incredible. Sir Jason also tells her about the analysis of the black powder, which contains a powerful narcotic. Patricia reveals she already had the powder analyzed herself. This other analysis was a test purely to see if he would tell the truth or lie, the latter of which would implicate him in her father's murder. Sir Jason reveals Cutter's sent the film to the Paris police, who are now after her for bribery.
As the police arrive, ready to arrest Patricia, Christopher snatches her away. He admits that he works for Interpol. Patricia tells Interpol that the narcotics were smuggled as May Fortune face powder, which was perfectly harmless until incinerated, when it turned into a hallucinogen. Nobody believes Cutter is smart enough to be the head of the narcotics ring.