Reviews

Even though she is billed third behind Lamour and MacMurray, Betty Hutton walks away with the picture. The plot is as old as the hills but the by play of the four Angel sisters is very amusing.

But the reason to watch the film is Betty Hutton. She is adorable in this film, has a couple of funny novelty musical numbers in addition to the ones she sings with her "sisters" and does a drunk scene that is one of the most hilarious that I have ever seen. Lamour had to do one later in the film and I felt sorry for her having to follow Hutton's performance.

Anyone who says that Judy Garland would have been better than Betty Hutton in the role of Annie Oakley either didn't see the outtakes of Garland or saw something that wasn't there. At that time in her life Judy Garland would not have brought to the role anything approaching the energy that Hutton brings to it.

Hutton was truly fantastic in the role and it is too bad that the experience was so bad for her but the backstory makes her performance seem even better. If Keel treated her as badly as Hutton claims then he should be ashamed of himself.

There are many great songs in the picture but to me the musical highlight of the film is the "You Can't Get A Man With A Gun" number. Hutton does such a great job on the number that I can't think of another actress who could have approached it. Robert Osborne on TCM said that when he saw the film in Seattle the audience broke into loud applause after that number.

The only weak part of the film is Calhern. Ordinarily I like his work but as Buffalo Bill he lacks the energy and charisma that the role requires.

I have to disagree with the person who said that Joan Crawford shined in this film and that it was a hit. She didn't and it wasn't. Also I think Crawford would have been completely miscast in My Man Godfrey.

What this film is is an amusing tale with Powell (as always), Montgomery and Frank Morgan all very good.

To see this type of story done right I would suggest watching Lubitsch's wonderful and unsurpassed Trouble in Paradise.

As someone who was glued to ABC in 1972 during the entire terrorist act this very well done documentary brought back horrible memories. But the memory of these murders must be kept alive because they obviously are not being taught to our children in school as the comments by someone who had never heard of the Olympic massacre point out.

The director pulls out all stops in presenting the story using archival footage, computer models, musical montages, film of the present day sites and interviews with the participants with the most noteworthy one being with the sole surviving murderer. The only criticism I have of the film is that the flashy editing sometimes works to trivialize the incidents.

It is very illuminating to read the prior comments made about this film. It is also very sad to see the morally bankrupt calls for putting the murders "in perspective" as if anything could justify the cold blooded massacre of innocents. But of course we hear those justifications today over the most recent massacres.

Olivia De Havilland won what has to be one of the most deserved Oscars ever for her performance in The Heiress. Being one of the most beautiful women to ever appear in films it is hard to accept her as plain in this film but she becomes the character so totally through her voice modulations and body language that she is utterly believable.

The rest of the cast is also very good especially Ralph Richardson in a role he played on the stage, although film lore has it that Wyler framed him so that many of his tricks to try to upstage De Havilland went unseen. ****

Irene Dunne is luminous in what critic Andrew Sarris called one of the finest comic creations in film history. Dunne and Grant (this film launched him as a huge star) play a couple who hastily divorce and then alternately take turns trying to win each other back. Ralph Bellamy has the Ralph Bellamy role and plays it perfectly. This was the first of three great pairings between Dunne and Grant (My Favorite Wife and Penny Serenade being the others).

Dunne is THE great overlooked movie star - primarily because so many of her films were remade with the originals being taken out of circulation by the film studio (e. g. Show Boat, The Awful Truth, My Favorite Wife, Anna and the King of Siam, Cimarron, Back Street, Magnificent Obsession, Roberta, Love Affair among others). She was nominated for 5 Academy Awards for Best Actress (2 comedies- TAT, Theodora Goes Wild, a western - Cimarron, a character role - I Remember Mama, and a romance - Love Affair) but never won. I can only imagine that politics played a part in her not getting a special lifetime achievement Oscar later in her life (she was a strong Republican), after all Ralph Bellamy himself got one and his film career paled next to Dunne's.

Watch Theodora Goes Wild for another great Dunne Screwball performance.