Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

The first must-see film of the year.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Betsy Drake's character here is just a little too weird for me to take this film seriously. As I watched the film -- both times -- I found myself thinking about which actresses could have carried this off and not seemed too unreal. I immediately thought of Katerine Hepburn. I have to admit, the other key players here -- Cary Grant and Franchot Tone -- managed to play opposite Drake well here. But, in fact, Diana Lynn -- a supporting actress here -- might have played the part better than Drake. But, ah well, I rest my case with the rather short list of films that Drake appeared in.Cary Grant is one of my two favorite actors. Grant, here, is as good as he always was, although I can't say that the material is top notch...not that it is bad, either.Franchot Tone, as the other man...dragged into a non-existent relationship. He was always good at playing the other man...with humor...and is here.And, near the end of the film, "Old Joe" is played by Eddie Albert/ The story? We would look at this film very differently today. It's about stalking, although this time it's the woman stalking the man. Seriously, what man would want a woman who would undoubtedly be so extremely as clinging as Betsy Drake's character. And that's what makes this film -- at least for me -- not work. Any man would run for their lives. Perhaps the best scene of the film is not between Cary Grant and Betsy Drake, but rather between Cary Grant and Franchot Tone.Cary Grant = 8. Betsy Drake = 5. Franchot Tone = 7. Diana Lynn = 7. Story line = 7. Result, a weak 7.I have quite a few Cary Grant films in my collection. This is not one of them...and will not be in the future. Watch it on TCM.

It's just another day at work for shop girls Betsy Drake and Diana Lynn, who over lunch decide that Every Girl Should Be Married. Especially after Betsy sees just the man she ought to be married to in the person of Cary Grant. Ironically enough that's exactly whom she did marry in real life.But back to this film, Betsy stalks and pursues him with the charm of an innocent child and as relentless as a jungle cat. These kind of films are kind of hard to pull off because if not done right you do come over like a stalker. Still Drake is successful enough to make you believe in her innocence.In fact for a film that stars Cary Grant and Franchot Tone, the real lead in the film is Betsy Drake. Grant does get in a few good moments however, the best being when he in his capacity as a noted pediatrician, Drake takes his audience away with her questions about his bachelorhood. Grant's reaction shots are priceless.Twelve years earlier Grant and Tone co-starred with Jean Harlow in Suzy with the billing completely reversed. It was at MGM and Tone's studio and Grant wasn't as big a name then. In those years their careers had completely reversed and Tone was now usually a second lead, but in this he was his usual rich playboy, the parts now he'd become used to being typecast in.In those same years Grant left his original studio at Paramount and his career pattern had him going back and forth from RKO and Columbia. Every Girl Should Be Married was Cary Grant's final film at RKO, a studio where he'd done such things as Bringing Up Baby, The Awful Truth, Mr Favorite Wife, and Mr. Lucky to name a few. Every Girl Should Be Married ain't quite up to the standards of these classics, but it has its moments.

*** Minor Spoilers: This fun film covers a lot of ground - kind of a love triangle, with some discussion of what women have to do to "catch the right man" going on about halfway through. Betsy Drake as Anabel is chasing (stalking) Cary Grant as Madison Brown, but she ends up being chased by another guy (Franchot Tone). They were deep in the Production Code during this time -- some things had to be hinted at.....ie Mr. Sanford ( from the restaurant) just wants to sleep with Anabel, not marry her. (Anabel actually says "Mr. Sanford just wants to play around" later in the film.) Also love the line where Madison says "the only place i'm safe is in a Turkish bath, and even there i'm not so sure..." When Anabel makes dinner, Julie the housemate says "It's not the dinner that wins him, it's the trimmings, like your dress, your hair..." Later, she says "They're having dinner at eight and who- knows-what at nine!" Notice Eddy Albert as Joe, the boyfriend from back home. (he would have been 42 by now). Also note that Diana Lynn gets top billing over Betsy Drake, since she had the bigger career established at the time. Things sure worked out in real life -- CG married Betsy D exactly a year to the day after this film was released on Christmas day! Don Hartman, director, producer, and writer, had done a bunch of the "Road" movies with Hope/Crosby throughout the 1940s, so he was sure familiar with comedy.

"nowlang" wins they prize for double-talk when posting in their review of this film:"I would like to explain my positive assessment of this movie and help newcomers form an opinion for themselves."One doesn't HELP someone form an opinion for themselves. By definition, it's something that must be done on ones own. This kind of movie does nothing but feed the outdated mindset that every girl has gotta get herself a MAN - by hook or by crook - or even by stalking.Thank god this kind of thinking has pretty much gone the way of the dodo.