It's a movie from a different era - and one of the appeals of it is the somewhat innocent "risque-ness" involved with the story, if that makes any sense. Bill (Ronald Reagan) shows up in New York on leave from the Army during the War, and expects to spend a fun weekend with Olive (Eve Arden.) But Olive gets what she thinks is a better offer and ditches Bill, leaving him to spend his time with Olive's friend Sally (Eleanor Parker.) Well, you can see where this is going. A lot of this seems very innocent - and even naive. And, yet, at the same time also surprisingly risque for a movie from this era. Sally has an ex-beau who has pajamas at her apartment. She and the beau had an earlier conversation about when it was appropriate for women (although not men) to "make love." What were those two up to, I wonder? Sally invites Bill (who she's just met) to stay in her apartment when he can't find a hotel room. And yet this is also surprisingly innocent. Bill and Sally are in separate rooms; Bill is really afraid that Olive will find out; at one point Bill and Sally share a glass of milk! There was something appealing in all of that. It was also, at times, mildly amusing. The way Sally takes her bed down at night. The scene (fairly commonplace) where Bill and Sally are speaking in the market with older women obviously misunderstanding what they mean - and the looks they give! The scene where Sally's dress accidentally falls off while Bill tries to fix the zipper was amusing, and Reagan displayed a pretty good facility for slapstick comedy in the last 15 -20 minutes when Olive comes to the apartment and neither Sally nor Bill want her to know he's there.
This is adapted from a stage play - and I didn't think it was a great adaptation. Stage plays and movies are different beasts, and this still felt in many ways to me like a stage play. It's also entirely predictable. There's never a moment in it when you doubt how this is all going to end up. The performances from the three leads were all right, but not spectacular, and while Parker and Reagan were both fine, I for one didn't really sense any particular spark between them.
This is a pleasant, mildly amusing movie that I'm sure didn't set the world on fire. For those who think of Reagan mostly as a politician and former US President, it's a decent look at his work as an actor, in which he displays some ability, but, frankly, it also shows why he was primarily a B-actor. (4/10)
This is adapted from a stage play - and I didn't think it was a great adaptation. Stage plays and movies are different beasts, and this still felt in many ways to me like a stage play. It's also entirely predictable. There's never a moment in it when you doubt how this is all going to end up. The performances from the three leads were all right, but not spectacular, and while Parker and Reagan were both fine, I for one didn't really sense any particular spark between them.
This is a pleasant, mildly amusing movie that I'm sure didn't set the world on fire. For those who think of Reagan mostly as a politician and former US President, it's a decent look at his work as an actor, in which he displays some ability, but, frankly, it also shows why he was primarily a B-actor. (4/10)