Here Come the Girls (1953) Review

Here Come the Girls
(1953, Paramount Pictures)

Yet another Bob Hope vehicle that has fallen into obscurity. As if you can’t tell by the poster, Here Come the Girls is a comedy-musical. The emphasis is on the musical. There are lots of numbers in this one because most of the movie takes place at a theater during a musical called, appropriately enough, “Here Come the Girls”. Working titles for the film were Champagne for Everyone and Girls Are Here to Stay.

The movie is set during the early 1900s and the plot is there’s a jealous killer on the loose who is out to murder the musical’s leading man because the killer wants the lead starlet (Arlene Dahl) all to himself. The cops & the musical’s director decide to put a chorus boy (Hope) in place of the leading man (Tony Martin) in order to lure “Jack the Slasher” out into the open. There’s some dark humor here as the play’s director didn’t want to risk the real leading man’s life and at one point he is disappointed when he is told the slasher didn’t kill Hope’s character. Of course, Hope’s character doesn’t realize he’s being used as bait and thinks that fortune has finally found its way to him and he believes he’s become a big star.

1993 VHS release

Supposedly the movie was originally shot for 3D but for whatever reason wasn’t released as such. They definitely made use of Technicolor though. Lots of elaborate flashy costumes and big bright stage settings.

I’m a bit confused as to who actually owns this movie. The only video release I can find for it is a 1993 VHS edition which was released by Paramount. So that tells me it’s not in the public domain but yet there is no DVD release. Now, the weird thing is the movie is available to stream from Netflix. I was thinking since Olive Films has gained the license to release a number of Paramount films (including Hope’s My Favorite Spy and Off Limits) and are streaming them through Netflix that maybe they held the rights to this movie but that doesn’t appear to be the case. I’m assuming that ultimately Paramount still holds the rights to the movie so hopefully the studio will see to it that this movie gets a new video release at some point. I think it’s only been in the last year or that so this movie has been available on Netflix.

While I certainly think this movie deserves to be release on video because it stars one of the greatest entertainers of all time I will say that this movie is not very memorable. Sure, there’s a great cast here but I think Here Comes the Girls focuses too much on being a musical and not enough on being a comedy.

EDIT (May 8, 2012):

I’ve been reading Donald McCaffrey’s book The Road to Comedy: The Films of Bob Hope and a little more light is shed on this movie. According to the original scriptwriter Edmund L. Hartmann, the film was NOT intended to be a musical. When asked about it turning from a comedy to a musical, Hartmann’s reply was “they fucked it up”. According to Hartmann, the script was considered to be the best Bob Hope movie yet by a number of people close to the project.

Ranking the Hope & Crosby ‘Road’ series

I’ve been on a serious kick lately with the Hope/Crosby ‘Road’ movies, so what better time to rank them than today?

For those of you not familiar with the franchise, the Road movies (referred to on/off as the Road to… movies or the “Road Pictures”) were a series of films that were equal parts comedy, romance, adventure, genre spoof and music.

Though the series was most prolific during the 1940s, seven films were made from 1940 – 1962 and they all starred two of the biggest entertainers of the era: Bing Crosby & Bob Hope. For the first six films, Dorothy Lamour c0-starred (and received billing over Hope for the first film) with Joan Collins co-starring in the series’ final entry while Lamour is relegated to a cameo role.

None of the films are direct sequels to the movies that came before it. Hope & Crosby basically play the same characters in each movie (Crosby is the smooth, girl-chasing con man and Hope is his not-so-smooth girl-chasing cowardly friend) but the names are always different. Dorothy Lamour is always the object of desire for both of the boys (except for the last one).

7. The Road to Hong Kong (1962, United Artists)

The only movie in the series not made for Paramount Pictures. Definitely the weakest in the entire series. By far. The guys had zero chemistry with Joan Collins, the age gap made for a creepy love triangle and it just doesn’t feel like a Road movie. I hate to say it but it was a sad, tired attempt to bring the franchise back to life. Despite spoofing the popular spy genre, Hope & Crosby seem a bit out of date here. They should have gone for a more classic Road feel rather than try to appeal to a younger generation with some of their jokes & gags.

For more of my thoughts on this movie, check out my review that I wrote back in 2010.

6.  Road to Rio (1947, Paramount)

By 1947, four years had passed since the last Road movie was in production (yes, Road to Utopia was released in 1946 but more on that in a bit). With this one, I think it shows that maybe everyone had gotten a bit rusty from that layoff and maybe the studio & crew forgot why the series had been so enjoyable in the first place. Road to Rio is nowhere near as out of place as The Road to Hong Kong but it doesn’t really click.

On paper this has the makings of a Road movie but for me the series really depends on the snappy dialogue between Hope & Crosby (who both ad-libbed a lot throughout the series) and it’s just not there for the most part. You might be able to chalk that up to the fact that they hadn’t worked together in four years and hadn’t gelled fully together again.

It also seems like Lamour is featured less in this movie than she previously had been. Hmm… I wonder if that has something to do with the fact that this was the first in the series to be co-produced by Hope Enterprises and Bing Crosby Enterprises. Even though I like the movie just for the fact that it stars Hope & Crosby, it’s nothing special and the ending is a cop-out (most of the endings kinda were, but this one even more-so).

An interesting note, and I didn’t even realize this until watching it again last night, is that the movie was written by Ed Beloin. Along with Bill Morrow, Beloin co-wrote Jack Benny’s radio program from 1936-1943. That’s a great era for Jack Benny, so it’s surprising I wasn’t really feeling this movie because I know just how funny Beloin can be.

5. Road to Bali (1952, Paramount)

The first movie in the series to be filmed in Technicolor and the first Road movie I ever watched. It’s also the only Road movie in the public domain so I picked it up as part of a 2-disc collection featuring a few other public domain comedies. In fact, the print of the film used on the copy I have comes from the UCLA Library. I really don’t understand how Paramount could let something like this fall into the public domain but then I don’t claim to have some great knowledge of how copyrights work in the first place.

Road to Rio showed a rusty Road crew after four years of inactivity but, surprisingly, the five years of rest before Road to Bali doesn’t seem to matter a bit. Bali isn’t a classic Road picture but it is very good. It meanders about for a very long time while we wait for the film’s antagonists to appear but it’s during these plot-thin moments that Hope & Crosby start trading quips & insults like it was the 1940s all over again.

Lots of fun cameos in this one: Bob Crosby (Bing’s brother), Humphrey Bogart (via footage from The African Queen), Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis and Jane Russell (co-star of Bob’s for 1948′s The Paleface and 1952′s Son of Paleface).

4. Road to Singapore (1940, Paramount)

It doesn’t feature all of the running gags that would later become synonymous with the series and the comedy isn’t as slapstick, silly or over the top but Road to Singapore (the first film in the series) is a classic in its own right.

It’s much more of a traditional movie than what would later come: there’s some romance, some drama, some comedy, some singing. Nothing really out ordinary for the era. This one has the most solid plot out of all the movies too and probably features the most romantic drama. Plot is something that becomes less and less important with later releases when basically you’re watching an hour and a half of Hope/Crosby trading one-liners.

There is actually a story being told here but I have to agree with Turner Classic Movies’ online review where they state that something about the film feels “off”. They chalk it up to no one really knowing in what direction to take the movie by way of dialogue. Both Hope and Crosby were ad-libbing and had their own personal writers on the set to feed them lines as well. The legend goes that once Hope & Crosby read the script, they tossed it out and pretty much ad-libbed the entire movie (which caused frustration for Lamour, the crew and the script-writers).

Great movie featuring everything we love about classic Hollywood. It’s fun to look back at this movie to see a more grounded Road picture.

3. Road to Zanzibar (1941, Paramount)

The second film in the series and it really starts to kick off the great running gags of the series (“patty-cake”) and slapstick humor. Great songs and more great dialogue with Bob, Bing and Dorothy traveling through the jungle. What more could you ask for? Oh, how about the super cute & quirky Una Merkel (who was in The Mad Doctor of Market Street)?

2. Road to Utopia (1946, Paramount)

Okay, so here’s the deal from what I can gather online: Road to Utopia went into production in 1943 and wrapped in March 1944 but was not released to the public until 1946 for three different reasons.

Whether these are true or not, I don’t know but here are the reasons:

1. Road to Morocco was still a strong box office draw and Paramount rightfully wanted to get as much money out of it as they could and didn’t want Utopia taking away from that

2. Paramount also did not want to distract from Going My Way, which was released in 1944 and starred Bing

3. Road to Utopia was one of a number of movies made during WWII that was shown to U.S. troops before being release to the civilian public

I’m not sure how much of an affect the last reason should have to delay a movie by two years but the first two reasons about not wanting to take away from the box office of Road to Morocco and Going My Way completely make sense.

For the movie itself, it’s a great one and I liked it much, much better now than when I first watched it years ago. Most of the series features Bob & Bing in a warm or tropical climate but this one takes them to Alaska during the gold rush (the “Utopia” mentioned in the title) of the early 1900s. I’ve seen reviews state this as the best of the series and it’s hard to argue that. You can make a case for any of the top three on my list to be the best of the series.

The dialogue is great. Don’t believe me? The movie was nominated for Best Screenplay at the 1947 Academy Awards. There’s even some nice action and the whole thing really captures Bing & Bob in their prime and firing on all cylinders. After all, at the time of filming, this was their fourth movie together in as many years and everything was clicking.

1. Road to Morocco (1942, Paramount)

This is the one that’s generally accepted to be the best of the entire series. If someone asked me to show them a Road picture, this would be it. I think you can make a strong case for Road to Utopia or Road to Zanzibar as being the best of the series, but this is the quintessential Road film that really conveys best what the entire series is all about.

Like Road to Utopia, it received a nomination for Best Screenplay. It was listed at #78 on the American Film Institute’s 100 Years… 100 Laughs list and was inducted into the National Film Registry in 1996.

So there you have it… All seven of the Road pictures ranked. The top four are absolute classics and I recommend them as essential viewing for anyone that is a fan of old movies. I also recommend Road to Bali but give only a mild recommendation for Road to Rio. Stay away from The Road to Hong Kong.

Bob Hope: Thanks for the Memories Collection – DVD Review

Bob Hope: Thanks for the Memories Collection (2010, Universal Studios Home Entertainment)
Run time: 8 hrs. 24 min.

Special Features:
Bob Hope and the Road to Success
Entertaining the Troops
Command Performance 1944
Theatrical Trailers
Command Performance 1945
Hollywood Victory Caravan
Sing-Alongs
Photograph Galleries

This is a fantastic collection of six Bob Hope movies (all originally were released by Paramount Pictures but have found themselves under the control of Universal Studios in modern times). Some of these films I had never seen before and some had never even been released on DVD until this collection. I was browsing around on Amazon and came across this release (which I never knew existed) the other week and being the huge Hope fan that I am, I ordered myself a copy. My ultimate goal is to own all of Hope’s movies anyway so I figured I might as well knock down six in one shot (even if I already own Road to Morocco from another Hope box set).

Thanks for the Memory (1938)

Making its DVD debut as a part of this collection is one of Bob Hope’s earliest movies. Thanks for the Memory is a romantic comedy/drama that pairs Hope again with the very pretty Shirley Ross. Their first pairing was in 1938′s Big Broadcast of 1938, where they would duet and debut Hope’s signature song “Thanks for the Memories” (the song is again sung during this film). Ultimately, while seeing Hope in the early stages of his career is fun, the film never really seems to go anywhere. Literally. Almost the entire movie takes place in the couple’s cozy apartment… talk about feeling claustrophobic!

It’s pretty interesting to see Hope in this type of role as a solid, stand-up guy (though his wisecracks and one-liners are in good supply) instead of the skirt-chasing, dollar-chasing buffoon he would play throughout most of the 1940s and 1950s.

The Cat and the Canary (1939)

A remake of the 1927 film of the same (and there’s been various remakes over the years since), this particular version of The Cat and the Canary is set as a horror comedy though you’d be hard-pressed to know that by looking at the movie poster. The film has a cult following and it too is debuting on DVD as a part of this collection. I was really surprised (in a good way) by this film, I knew it was a mystery but was thinking because it was Bob Hope, the comedy was going to override all of that. In fact, the whole movie is played straight with only Hope adding comic relief at times. The theatrical trailer certainly sets the tone that this movie is a horror thriller. It’s just so weird to see Hope star in a movie like this but the film is very good and even if it did not feature Hope and was played completely straight, I think the film would still have a cult following.

The Ghost Breakers (1940)

Caught this one for the first time last year through Netflix and liked it a lot so I’m glad to finally own it. It’s another horror comedy co-starring Goddard but unlike The Cat and the Canary there’s much more comedy and romance thrown into this film and anything that could be deemed horrific doesn’t really sprout up until the third act once they finally get to the haunted house.

Nothing But The Truth (1941)

Another DVD debut and also the third movie in this collection to pair up Hope with the striking Paulette Goddard. These two definitely had some chemistry together. It’s a shame they only made three movies together. Bob Hope was teamed up with many beautiful women throughout the years but out of all of the women he was teamed up with, I think I like the Hope/Goddard pairing best (though obviously the chemistry with Dorothy Lamour and Lucille Ball was off the charts and the Paleface movies with Jane Russell made for a great pairing as well).

Paullette is truly the All-American girl next door, someone you’d love to take him to mom. She’s absolutely adorable and his warmth fills the screen. That innocent quality she brings works much better with the type of scheming buffoon characters Hope plays as opposed to him running around chasing some sexpot like Russell or Lamour.

Road to Morocco(1942)Another classic Road movie. Despite it being selected for preservation by the Library of Congress for the U.S. National Film Registry and despite it being listed at #78 on AFI’s 100 Funniest movies list, it has come under fire in modern times for its stereotypical portrayal of the Middle East.

While political correctness is something I’ll leave to others to argue about, this is the series’ best film and I enjoy it for what it is — a screwy comedy starring three classic actors with great chemistry.

The Paleface (1948)

Not to be confused with the 1922 movie of the same name, The Paleface sees Hope & Jane Russell tangling with dynamite smugglers and Indians Native Americans. This is a fun movie with Bob being Bob and Jane Russell playing as his sexy no-nonsense protector Calamity Jane.

A sequel (Son of Paleface) followed in 1952 and this movie was remade as The Shakiest Gun in the West in 1968 and starred Don Knotts.

Overall, a GREAT collection if you’re a Bob Hope fan and since I only owned one movie from this collection already and hadn’t seen three of them, buying this was a no-brainer. All the films are enjoyable but Thanks For the Memory really pales when compared to the rest. Still, it’s interesting to see this set start with such humble film beginnings from Hope and then end with his trademark zaniness in Road to Morocco and The Paleface. I also strongly recommend checking out The Cat and the Canary and The Ghost Breakers for those that like comedy mixing with their horror.

Bob Hope: Thanks for the Memories Collection at Amazon.com

Movie of the Day: The Ghost Breakers

It wasn’t until watching this movie for what I thought was the first time that I realized I had seen it before! I began to remember the first 20 minutes or so of the movie, but after that, I guess I must have used the movie as background noise or fallen asleep during it because it all seemed new to me.

The Ghost Breakers is a 1940 thriller/mystery/comedy that was just one in a large number of films Bob Hope did under his contract with Paramount Pictures. It is also the second movie he did opposite of the beautiful Paulette Goddard They first starred together in 1939′s horror/comedy The Cat and the Canary, which was released by Paramount but was a remake of the 1927 Universal silent horror film of the same name.

Of all the Bob Hope movies I’ve seen, this is one of his better non-Road movies. The movies displays a perfect balance of Bob Hope’s comedy brilliance and one-liners along with some actual spooky scenes later in the movie. Also of note is the further comic relief of Willie Best (who plays the valet of Hope’s character). Best has some of the best lines in the movie, if you can look look past the stereotypical 1940s “colored man” role he is playing (his entrance into the movie had me cringe a bit).

The movie starts off seemingly like a zany Hope comedy, another case of mistaken identity as a murderer and on the run from the mob.As radio crime reporter Lawrence Lawrence (his middle name is Lawrence too, y’know), Hope is quickly swept up into the current woes of Mary Carter (Goddard), who stands to inherit an old family castle down on Black Island in Cuba, but it appears someone or something doesn’t want her to come into possession of it!

Of course, all of this comes to a head in Cuba and on the atmospheric Black Island where murderers, thieves, ghosts, skeletons and zombies (of the voodoo variety) are abound!

Well worth looking into for Hope fans and it may not be a Universal movie, but this is also a recommend for anyone a fan of classic horror comedies like Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.

The movie is based on a play of the same name, but has actually been filmed twice before as a silent film. Once in 1914 with director Cecil B. DeMille and again in 1922. Both prints are lost. Another remake was released under the title of Scared Stiff starring Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in 1953.

Ford Fairlane, Rock ‘N’ Roll Detective

The Adventures of Ford Fairlane is an underrated movie. It’s your typical goofy late 80s/early 90s action-comedy, but Andrew Dice Clay (my favorite comedian) gives the movie a ton of charm and carries the film well. There’s also some entertaining casting choices. My personal favorite is Motley Crue’s Vince Neil as rock star Bobby Black and I always found Wayne Newton to be a legit sleazy and unlikeable guy, so it’s fitting he’s the lead villain here.

The Diceman doesn’t stretch himself too far. Ford Fairlane is basically Andrew Dice Clay and that’s what makes this movie so fun. The movie is a slick, brainless throwback to the old detective movies filled with one-liners from Ford, complete with narration by him as well. The movie falls apart a bit at the end, but that’s easily forgiven when everything previous to that has been so fun. Even my woman liked it (and she doesn’t like ANY of “my kind” of movies or Clay).

I loved the movie so much I picked up my video store’s previously viewed VHS when we started to shrink our VHS catalog. It wasn’t on DVD yet, but when it was released on DVD just a year or two later, I found it in one of those $5 DVD bins at Walmart and quickly snatched it up.

The movie was released at the height of Clay’s career. He had many supporters (and just as many detractors) thanks to his “blue” standup routine and naughty nursey rhymes, yet the movie was not a success. It only took in $21 million dollars total and according to Clay, it was pulled from many theaters due to complaints of being politically incorrect. Surely, being released about the same time Days of Thunder, Die Hard 2 and Ghost didn’t help the movie either. As far as the complaints over the tone and “correctness” of the movie go, I say some people just need to lighten up and understand comedy is not meant to be taken seriously and neither is the “Diceman” character… which is what Andrew Clay portrays when he’s on stage– a CHARACTER.

DICE FACT: DC Comics published a four-issue Adventures of Ford Fairlane prequel mini-series from May-August 1990 (yes, I own this too).