For those who know that Loretta Young had an affair with Clark Gable many years before this movie, when he was married, and had a daughter whom she pretended she adopted, their romantic pairing here may seem embarrassing rather than exciting. What's also awkward is that both too old for the silly incidents that make up the he-man vs. beautiful spinster plot: woman embarrassed by sexy dance in nightclub, people arrested by mistake, man thrown into fountain. The dumb joke of people talking at cross-purposes (respectable woman mistaken for party girl, men in adjoining phone booths not realising they are talking to each other) is repeated again and again. They are also too old to fall in love and decide to get married on the same night--by the standards of the time, Young, at 37, would have been, like Gable at 49, middle aged. And both are too old to be resolving matters with a knock-down, drag-out fight (Young with Marilyn Maxwell, Gable with Raymond Burr) that is very obviously performed with stand-ins. Two references to earlier Gable greats (Young plays "San Francisco" on the piano during a nightclub riot, Gable threatens to break a woman's bedroom door down, as he did in Gone with the Wind) are not cheekily amusing, just depressing reminders of much better movies.
In a way, the worst thing about the movie is the way it exemplifies its time. It's so Fifties! Although Young has devoted her life to public service, Clark Gable just has to kiss her and she can't wait to throw over her career and start baking cookies. The lazy direction, lacking rhythm and snap, of this story full of holes, that invites us to laugh at grownups acting silly is typical of that patronising, anti- intellectual decade.
On the plus side, there are some clever lines and a good cast of supporting players, including Raymond Walburn and Jimmy Gleason. I don't include among them Frank Morgan (the Wizard of Oz), doing his tongue- tied, fumble-thumbs schtick for the umpteenth time. Am I the only one who thinks he acts like a child molester?
In a way, the worst thing about the movie is the way it exemplifies its time. It's so Fifties! Although Young has devoted her life to public service, Clark Gable just has to kiss her and she can't wait to throw over her career and start baking cookies. The lazy direction, lacking rhythm and snap, of this story full of holes, that invites us to laugh at grownups acting silly is typical of that patronising, anti- intellectual decade.
On the plus side, there are some clever lines and a good cast of supporting players, including Raymond Walburn and Jimmy Gleason. I don't include among them Frank Morgan (the Wizard of Oz), doing his tongue- tied, fumble-thumbs schtick for the umpteenth time. Am I the only one who thinks he acts like a child molester?