Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948)

   "...you may agree with Grant that anyone who builds these days is crazy..."

With Myrna Loy and Melvyn Douglas.

Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"Next to an exciting mystery or horror film there's nothing so relaxing as a good comedy.  But what makes one man laugh makes the next guy scowl.  I have listed below a few notes on recent pictures that may tickle your funny bone.  Blandings is the only one that had me rolling in the aisles (what a silly figure of speech!), however the others may roll you.  Every man to his own aisle.  

No doubt the secret of Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House is that you see yourself, as this city dweller and his family endure the confinements of a small New York apartment, dream of a home in the country, buy one, get fleeced right and left as they rebuild, but finally survive everything and live to enjoy the place in spite of all the plotting of man and nature against them.  Director H. C. Potter knows people and has given us a series of funny episodes that range from documentary-like shots of New York and its crowded millions to bucolic scenes of the hinterlands complete with the vicissitudes of the open spaces and commuter trains.  Of course Eric Hodgins's original story deserves much of the credit for the fun; scriptwriters Norman Panama and Melvin Frank have broadened the themes, but they have retained the warm humor and clever satire of the Hodgins book.  The cast is excellent: Cary Grant giving one of his best portrayals as the frustrated advertising man, Myrna Loy looking like and acting like the ideal wife, Melvyn Douglas responding as this couple's best friend and lawyer, and a large group of supporting players, not forgetting the real estate agent who knows a sucker when he sees one and he sees one.  The Grant-Loy-Douglas triangle is a little forced, and the film is rather long for its single home-building theme.  But the laughs continue to the end; and while you may agree with Grant that anyone who builds these days is crazy, you are more likely to agree with Douglas that the result is worth it."

Philip T. Hartung, Commonweal

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Number 52 - Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House (Lobby Card Style)

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On This Day, 25th March 2021

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Bringing Up Baby (1938)

   "Actor Grant...more interested in an intercostal clavicle for his nearly reconstructed Brontosaurus than he is in bony, scatterbrained Miss Hepburn."

With Katharine Hepburn.

Bringing Up Baby - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"When she was college girl ten years ago, red-headed, Melpomene-mouthed Katharine Hepburn, in a trailing white nightgown cross-hatched with gold ribbon, regaled Bryn Mawr as Pandora in The Woman in the Moon.  And since then most of Actress Hepburn's public appearances have been for the catch-in-the-throat cinema, playing alternately great ladies and emotional starvelings of brittle bravado.  For Bringing Up Baby she plumps her broad A in the midst of a frantically farcical plot involving Actor Cary Grant, a terrier, a leopard, a Brontosaurus skeleton and a crotchety collection of Connecticut quidnuncs, proves she can be as amusingly skittery a comedienne as the best of them.  

Actor Grant is an earnest, bespectacled paleontologist who is more interested in an intercostal clavicle for his nearly reconstructed Brontosaurus than he is in bony, scatterbrained Miss Hepburn.  Miss Hepburn has a pet leopard named Baby, and an aunt with $1,000,000 waiting for the right museum.  On the trail of the million, Actor Grant crosses paths with Actress Hepburn and Baby, loses the scent in the tangled Connecticut wildwood.  In the jail of a town very like arty Westport, the trails collide.  Most surprising scene:  Actress Hepburn, dropping her broad A for a nasal Broadway accent, knocking Town Constable Walter Catlett and Jailmate Grant completely off balance with: "Hey, flatfoot!  I'm gonna unbutton my puss and shoot the woiks.  An' I wouldn' be squealin' if he hadn' a give me the runaround for another twist."  

Under the deft, directorial hand of Howard Hawks, Bringing Up Baby comes off second only to last year's whimsical high spot, The Awful Truth, but its gaily inconsequent situations cannot match the fuselike fatality of that extraordinary picture.  Bringing Up Baby's slapstick is irrational, rough-and-tumble, undignified, obviously devised with the idea that the cinema audience will enjoy (as it does) seeing stagy Actress Hepburn get a proper mussing up." 

- Time

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Number 30 -Bringing Up Baby (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today, March 18th 2022  

The Amazing Adventure of Ernest Bliss (1937)

   "Cary Grant...secures laughs easily and apparently without effort."

With Mary Brian.

The Amazing Adventure of Ernest Bliss - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"E. Phillips Oppenheim's story (filmed years ago as a silent) is a bit old-fashioned and present-day filmgoers may regard it as implausible.  Coincidences are highly improbable, and the whole thing, despite excellent direction and acting, moves at a pace that demands a large measure of cutting before being offered to the general public.  Implausibilities include an elderly lodging house keeper who refuses to oust a man from his room, despite arrears of rent, when she could get cash from someone else.  Also encountering his former gold-digger mistress who, finding him working as a chauffeur, deliberately leaves her diamond bracelet in the car.  

In the end everything comes out all right, of course, and he is enabled to provide liberally for all those who were kind to him during his self-imposed poverty.  

There is a mechanical progression in the photographic sequences which lacks credence, but this may be fixed by cutting, thereby speeding up the movement towards the story's culmination.  

Cary Grant looks and acts the part with deft characterization.  He secures laughs easily and apparently without effort.  Mary Brian plays the role of the typist with a metallic harshness which would be more in keeping with the gold digger.  One expects more feminine softness and sympathy from such a role.  Most of the other actors and actresses are adequate, and production details are very good."  

- Joshua Lowe, Variety

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Number 26 - The Amazing Adventure of Ernest Bliss (Lobby Card Style)

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When You're In Love (1937)

   "...Director Capra established Clark Gable and Gary Cooper as comedians, Director Riskin herein does the same thing for Cary Grant."

With Grace Moore.

When You're In Love - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"The picture marks the debut of Robert Riskin, long famed as the screenwriting teammate of  Director Frank Capra, as a director as well as author.  Following the pattern of It Happened One Night and Mr Deeds Goes to Town in which Director Capra established Clark Gable and Gary Cooper as comedians, Director Riskin herein does the same thing for Cary Grant." 

- Time Magazine

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Number 25 - When You're In Love (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today, February 27th 2022

The Woman Accused (1933)

   "For the finish, the hero, as done capably by Cary Grant, wields a blacksnake whip on the gangster..."

With Nancy Carroll.

The Woman Accused - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"Despite two of the silliest exhibitions of melodramatics, the exploitation campaign and Liberty mag tieup behind Woman Accused should aid materially in putting it across to average returns.  To counterbalance the pair of moronic scenes is a wow finish that had the audience cheering. 

Billed as the picture written by ten of the world's greatest authors, it is not conceivable that the literary names concerned could have permitted, let alone have written, the aforementioned offending sequences.  

First sequence that went smello was the deep-dyed villainy of Louis Calhern in an effort to build up a logical reason for the girl, Nancy Carroll, to kill him.  Second was the mock-trial during a "cruise to nowhere" which was carried to silly extremes.  Both can be touched up by judicious cutting.  

Unfortunate that Calhern and John Halliday have been handed such parts, that no amount of good trouping can surmount the amount of ham written into each line.  

For the finish, the hero, as done capably by Cary Grant, wields a blacksnake whip on the gangster, key witness against the girl, giving film fans probably their first real satisfaction at the manner in which a mobster should be handled.  After a perfect buildup as a menace, Jack La Rue brings audience applause when he turns into jelly after the larruping administered by Grant.  

Some novel directorial angles in the "Strange Interlude" treatment of the accused woman's fear and terror, and the atmosphere of the pleasure cruise.  Nancy Carroll's work is well-done and sincere and Norma Mitchell, as her maid, gives a sweet performance.  Latter's work here is of the quality that should win her a good play from the casting directors.  Such people as Irving Pichel, Frank Sheridan, Harry Holman and Donald Stuart are in for short, but capably done, bits." 

- Daily Variety

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Number 9 - The Woman Accused (Lobby Card Style)

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Gunga Din (1939)

   "Hollywood, however, even when it was not deliberately repeating itself, repeated itself unconsciously.  Gunga Din is an example of this unconscious repetition."

With Victor McLaglen.

Gunga Din - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"Gunga Din, the most expensive picture in the history of RKO, which was last week on the point of emerging from a six-year bankruptcy, unfolds a jolly story about high jinks on India's frontier.  Poor old Gunga Din has small part of the proceedings.  In the first part of the picture he wobbles about carrying a goatskin water bag.  In the last part, he inspires a scared-looking Rudyard Kipling to produce a commemorative poem.  The rest of the time Gunga Din's doings are eclipsed by those of the three agile young sergeants - Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.  The story of Gunga Din appears to be a sort of Anglo-Indian Three Musketeers.  Funny, spectacular, and exciting.  Typical sequence: battle between a regiment of Scots Highlanders and Thug cavalry, filmed on the slopes of Mt. Whitney last summer, with a cast of 900 extras.  

As an individual product of the cinema industry, there is practically nothing to be said against Gunga Din.  First-class entertainment, it will neither corrupt the morals of minors nor affront the intelligence of their seniors.  But unfortunately, Gunga Din is not an isolated example of the cinema industry's majestic mass product.  It is a symbol of Hollywood's current trend.  As such it is as deplorable as it is enlightening.  

Hollywood, however, even when it was not deliberately repeating itself, repeated itself unconsciously.  Gunga Din is an example of this unconscious repetition.  Whatever there is to be said about the minor matter of barrack-room life in India has been more than sufficiently said by the cinema many times, most recently in Lives of a Bengal Lancer, Charge of the Light Brigade and Drums.  

Moving pictures are a vigorous entertainment medium.  There has probably never been a moment in the world's history when more exciting things were going on than in this year of 1939.  That Hollywood can supply no better salute to 1939 than a $2,000,000 rehash, however expert, of Rudyard Kipling and brown Indians in bed sheets, is a sad reflection on its state of mind." 

- Time

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Number 32 - Gunga Din (Lobby Card Style)

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Wings in the Dark (1935)

 "Cary Grant gives a splendid performance as the tragic young flyer..."

With Myrna Loy.

Wings in the Dark - Review is taken from 'The Films of Cary Grant' by Donald Deschner (1973):

"After a flying start, literally and figuratively, this film sags in the middle, and then closes on another high note, the net result being a nice little picture for the family trade that, with the Grant-Loy drawing power, will do better than average at the box office.

Cary Grant gives a splendid performance as the tragic young flyer, and Myrna Loy does well with a role not entirely her sort.

Roscoe Karns has a fat part as the girl flier's manager and gets all the laughs possible from it. A delightful surprise is an outstanding bit of work by Hobart Cavanaugh, playing, with a comic Scotch burr, the mechanic pal of Grant.

Dean Jagger, Russell Hopton, and Matt McHugh stand out in bits, and the cast has been well handled by director James Flood. Earl Robinson's handling of the air stuff rates special attention and the photography, both aerial and studio is first rate." 

- The Hollywood Reporter

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Number 19 - Wings in the Dark (Lobby Card Style)

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Wings in the Dark, On This Day, 1st February 2021

Quote From Today... She Done Him Wrong (1933)

"I'm sorry you think more of your diamonds than you do of your soul."

With Mae West.

She Done Him Wrong was Cary Grant's 8th full-length feature film.

Captain Cummings: I'm sorry you think more of your diamonds than you do of your soul.

Lady Lou: I'm sorry you think more of my soul than you do of my diamonds.

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Number 8 - She Done Him Wrong (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today... Room For One More (1952)

"I had to draw it from memory."

Room For One More was Cary Grant's 57th full-length feature film.

Anna Perrott Rose: What's that supposed to be?

George 'Poppy' Rose: A woman.

Anna Perrott Rose: Not a very good likeness...

George 'Poppy' Rose: I had to draw it from memory.

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Number 57 - Room For One More (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today... His Girl Friday (1940)

"If you had been a gentleman, you would have forgotten all about it. But not you!"

With Rosalind Russell.

His Girl Friday was Cary Grant's 35th full length feature film.

Hildy Johnson: I suppose I proposed to you?

Walter Burns: Well, you practically did, making goo-goo eyes at me for two years until I broke down.

[impersonates Hildy, flutters his eyelashes]

Walter Burns: "Oh, Walter." And I still claim I was tight the night I proposed to you. If you had been a gentleman, you would have forgotten all about it. But not you!

Hildy Johnson: [hurls her purse at him] Why, you! !...

Walter Burns: [ducks and her purse barely misses him] You're losing your eye. You used to be able to pitch better than that.

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Number 35 - His Girl Friday (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today... The Philadelphia Story (1941)

  "When I was trying to stop drinking, I read anything."

With Katharine Hepburn and James Stewart.

The Philadelphia Story was Cary Grant's 38th full length feature film.

Macaulay Connor: What's this? Is it my book?

C. K. Dexter Haven: Yes.

Macaulay Connor: C. K. Dexter Haven, you have unsuspected depth!

C. K. Dexter Haven: Thanks, old chap.

Macaulay Connor: But have you read it?

C. K. Dexter Haven: When I was trying to stop drinking, I read anything.

Macaulay Connor: And did you stop drinking?

C. K. Dexter Haven: Yes. Your book didn't do it, though.

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Number38 - The Philadelphia Story (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today... Enter Madame! (1935)

 'I think I'm the luckiest man in the world."

With Elissa Landi.

Enter Madame! was Cary Grant's 18th full-length feature film.

Mr. Farnum: Think you can take it?

Gerald Fitzgerald: What do you mean?

Mr. Farnum: I mean, have you any idea what it's like being married to an opera singer?

Gerald Fitzgerald: Sure. I think I'm the luckiest man in the world.

Mr. Farnum: You'll have to be.

Lisa Della Robbia: Farnum, what a horrible thing to say.

Mr. Farnum: I'm not talking against you, madame. It's your job.

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Number 18 - Enter Madame (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today... Sylvia Scarlett (1936)

"...nobody's enemy but me own."

With Katharine Hepburn.

Sylvia Scarlett was Cary Grant's 21st full-length feature film.

Jimmy Monkley: Little friend of all the world, nobody's enemy but me own.

Sylvia Scarlett: Yeah, I can tell that by the look of you.

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Number 21 - Sylvia Scarlett (Lobby Card Style)

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Quote From Today... Destination Tokyo (1943)

"How do you think the rest of us feel?"

On deck!

Destination Tokyo was Cary Grant's 44th full-length feature film.

Reserve Officer Raymond: [during a depth charge attack] Captain, I'm no good.

Capt. Cassidy: Why's that?

Reserve Officer Raymond: I'm scared stiff.

Capt. Cassidy: How do you think the rest of us feel?

Reserve Officer Raymond: You're not scared. I've looked at your faces.

Capt. Cassidy: I've looked at yours, too. It's the same as the others.

Reserve Officer Raymond: You're scared?

Capt. Cassidy: I'll say I am. And so is everybody else.

Quote From Today.... Madame Butterfly (1932)

"Oh, I guess she'd pass in a crowd"

With Sylvia Sidney.full-length

Madame Butterfly was Cary Grant's 7th full length feature film.

Cho-Cho San: [Cho-Cho San has found Adelaide's photo in Pinkerton's trunk. She brings it to him with the pipe cleaners] I found them like this

Lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton: Thank you very much, Cho-Cho San

[he puts the photo aside]

Cho-Cho San: She very beautiful, that American lady

Lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton: Oh, I guess she'd pass in a crowd

Cho-Cho San: She some lady you know very well?

Lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton: Sure, sure. We've known each other for years

Cho-Cho San: She love you very much, perhaps?

Lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton: No, of course not

Cho-Cho San: [she picks up the photo and points to the inscription that reads 'To Bin with all my love always'] What this writing say?

Lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton: Oh, that. That just says 'lots of luck'

Cho-Cho San: Oh. But maybe you very much in love with her?

Lieutenant B.F. Pinkerton: How can I have room in my heart for anyone but Madame Butterfly?

Quote From Today... Every Girl Should be Married (1948)

"How in the world did Eve ever get Adam..."

With Franchot Tone.

Every Girl Should be Married was Cary Grant's 53rd full length feature film.

Dr. Madison Brown: How in the world did Eve ever get Adam when she had no other woman to help her with the subtle little touches?

Quote From Today... Father Goose (1964)

"Just repeat three words. Alright. Elephant."

Father Goose was Cary Grant's 71st and penultimate full-length feature film.

Walter Eckland: [Jenny, who won't talk, has just given him a bottle of liquor. She doesn't reply when he says "Thank you." He holds up a whistle] See this whistle?

[Jenny nods "yes"]

Walter Eckland: Would you like to have it?

[She nods "yes" again]

Walter Eckland: OK. Now, all you have to do is repeat three simple words after me. Is that a deal?

[She nods "yes"]

Walter Eckland: Just repeat three words. Alright. Elephant.

Jenny: [Looks from Eckland to the whistle and back. Seems to consider for a moment] Elephant.

Walter Eckland: [He smiles, slightly] Rhinoceros.

Jenny: [More quickly this time] Rhinoceros.

Walter Eckland: Wrong.

Jenny: Why?

Walter Eckland: No, not "why," "wrong." Wrong is the third word. You lose.

Quote From Today... The Grass is Greener (1960)

  

"Oh. You mean you prefer to be unhappy

 and abnormal."

With Robert Mitchum

The Grass is Greener was Cary Grant's 68th full-length feature film.

Trevor Sellers, the Butler: I wonder if I might have a word with you, Milord.

Victor Rhyall, Earl: So do I, so we're both probably right. Now what's the matter, Sellers?

Trevor Sellers, the Butler: As I told you, Milord, I haven't any work to do.

Victor Rhyall, Earl: What about your novel, why aren't you working at that?

Trevor Sellers, the Butler: I'm stuck badly. Nearly tore the whole thing up last night.

Victor Rhyall, Earl: Oh, now, now, you mustn't do that! What's the trouble?

Trevor Sellers, the Butler: Almost certainly the basic trouble is myself. I'm fundamentally happy and contented. That's bad enough, of course. But on top of that, I'm normal. And that's fatal.

Victor Rhyall, Earl: Oh. You mean you prefer to be unhappy and abnormal.

Trevor Sellers, the Butler: Of course! You see, I want to be a success, and to be a success, one must at least start off by being modern. And like yourself, Milord, I'm not. It means I have no feelings of insecurity or frustration. No despair.

Victor Rhyall, Earl: And that's essential?

Trevor Sellers, the Butler: The first essential! I feel perfectly content, really rather blameless, and hardly resent anything at all!

Victor Rhyall, Earl: Well, you are in a pickle, aren't you? Well now, you must have known all that when you gave up teaching to become a writer! You answered my advertisement for a butler, and when I asked you what your qualifications were you said you had a degree in science. Now in spite of such a ludicrous recommendation I engaged you, partly because you told me you wanted to write a novel. Luckily you turned out very well. Now, why don't you go back to your typewriter and take another crack at this, Sellers, might do you good. You might feel better now!

Quote From Today... Alice in Wonderland (1933)

   

"...because he taught us,..."

With William Austin and Charlotte Henry.

Alice in Wonderland was Cary Grant's 13th full-length feature film.

Alice: Why did you call him Tortoise, if he wasn’t one?

Mock Turtle: We called him Tortoise because he taught us, really you are very dull!”

Quote From Today... Kiss Them For Me (1957)

"True love almost always fades, but money stays green forever."

With Suzy Parker

Kiss Them For Me was Cary Grant's 63rd full length feature film.

Gwinneth Livingston: And that, Mr. Crewson, is why I'm engaged to Mr. Turnbill. He's alive now, and he'll still be alive at the end of the war. He's filthy rich now, and he'll be even filthier rich then.

Cmdr. Andy Crewson: That's the stuff. True love almost always fades, but money stays green forever.

Quote From Today... Charade (1963)

"...I didn't have the sense in those days to be sensible."

With Audrey Hepburn.

Charade was Cary Grant's 70th full-length feature film.

Adam Canfield: All right, get set for the story of my life.

Reggie Lampert: Fiction or non-fiction?

Adam Canfield: Eh, why don't you shut up?

Reggie Lampert: Well!

Adam Canfield: Are you going to listen?

Reggie Lampert: Go on...

Adam Canfield: Now, when I was a young man, my father expected me to go into his business. Umbrella frames. That's what he made. A sensible business, I suppose, but I didn't have the sense in those days to be sensible.

Reggie Lampert: [looking skeptical] I suppose all this is leading somewhere...

Adam Canfield: Well, it led me away from umbrella frames, for one thing. But that left me without any honest means of support.

Reggie Lampert: What do you mean?

Adam Canfield: Well, in this highly competitive world, when a man has no profession, there isn't much choice, so I began looking for people who had more money than they needed... including some, they'd barely miss.

Reggie Lampert: You mean you're a thief?

Adam Canfield: Well, that's not exactly the term I'd have chosen, but it sort of captures the spirit of the thing.

Reggie Lampert: I don't believe it!

Quote From Today... Operation Petticoat (1959)

"Well, I like to think we can, but then, I'm an incurable optimist."

With Tony Curtis.

Operation Petticoat was Cary Grant's 67th full length feature film.

Operation Petticoat (1959)

Lt. Nicholas Holden: The scuttlebutt is that we're going to try to submerge at daybreak, and I figured if you've got to go, you might as well go big.

Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman: Mr. Holden, it's past daybreak, and we are submerged.

Lt. Nicholas Holden: We are?

Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman: We are.

Lt. Nicholas Holden: You mean, we're under?

Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman: Yes.

Lt. Nicholas Holden: Well, it isn't a permanent situation, er... What I'm trying to say is, I mean, we can come up if we like to.

Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman: Well, I like to think we can, but then, I'm an incurable optimist.

Lt. Nicholas Holden: What happens, sir, if we, er... What happens if we can't...?

[he motions upward]

Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman: Oh, well, if we can't, er...

[he motions upward]

Lt. Cmdr. Matt T. Sherman: ..., then, we, er...

[he motions downward]