Showing posts with label George Marshall. Show all posts
Showing posts with label George Marshall. Show all posts
Pop Angel (Raymond Walburn) lives with his four daughters and tries to encourage them in a musical career, but only one of them, Bobby (Betty Hutton), has singing aspirations. Forcing her sisters to accompany her on a club date, they meet bandleader Happy Morgan (Fred MacMurray), a heel with a conscience. He promises Bobby a job in New York and takes money she won gambling, which sister Nancy (Dorothy Lamour) is determined to get back. To Manhattan the four gals go. Happy finds himself romancing both sisters to keep them at bay, although he's only in love with one of them. Can true love find a way through this mess...? And the Angels Sing is pleasant and the performances are good. The other two Angel sisters are played by Diana Lynn [Ruthless] and Mimi Chandler. MacMurray sings, but not that well, and Hutton [The Betty Hutton Show] "overacts" her supposedly comedic song numbers to the point where they're hard to take. A subdued Frank Albertson [Psycho] plays Nancy's easily discarded boyfriend, Oliver, and Eddie Foy Jr. is cast as MacMurray's bandmate, Fuzzy. There are a couple of saucy song numbers.
Verdict: Amiable tomfoolery. **1/2.
 |
| Fred MacMurray |
Lawyer J. C. Thompson (Douglass Dumbrille) dispatches his secretary, Christy (Eleanor Parker) to tell radio personality Peter Lockwood (Fred MacMurray) that he's inherited two million dollars, but not before she's importuned by Patsy (Una Merkle) to go after the guy and get herself a wealthy husband. The trouble is that Peter is just about to get married to fiancee June (Kay Buckley), and neither he nor anyone else believes Christy about the money. Peter's rival, Dr. Roland Cook (Richard Carlson of All I Desire) thinks Christy is a mental case who needs his help -- and so on. A Millionaire for Christy is frenetic but absolutely and completely laughless -- you sit there and watch this, utterly stupefied, helplessly observing McMurray and Parker [Lizzie] struggling to bring life to an utterly hopeless script. Dumbrille [Alimony] is completely wasted. Nestor Paiva has a small role.
Verdict: Not even Fred can save this one. Atrocious. *.
 |
| Maxwell, Hope and Rooney |
Wally Hogan (Bob Hope) is a fight manager who loses his only client, the champ, when his associates trick him into joining the Army. Hogan meets a fellow named Herbert Tuttle (Mickey Rooney), who hopes to become a boxer and gets Hogan to take him on. This puts a crimp in Hogan's romance with club owner and singer Connie (Marilyn Maxwell of The Show-Off), who is Herbert's aunt and doesn't want him to fight. It all leads to mostly forgettable complications. The picture was originally titled Military Police because the boys become MP's. As was the case with most of his movies, especially the later ones like this, Hope doesn't so much act as saunter jovially through the movie. Rooney, who actually does give a performance, is more subdued than usual. Hope's character has a bevy of marriage-minded women -- all of them hot babes, natch, who would normally be out of his league -- chasing after him while Rooney isn't even given a girlfriend. This is Hope's picture, and one suspects Rooney was never allowed to forget it, even though he's more appealing than ol' ski-nose. Maxwell is Maxwell. Eddie Mayehoff is the uptight but likable commanding officer. The best scene is a riotous and very well-choreographed free-for-all in Connie's club with virtually everyone swinging at somebody else. There's also a cat-fight between Carolyn Jones and another one of the ladies positively panting for Hope.
Verdict: Neither Hope nor Rooney's best but it has its moments, however few. **.