Who payed the critics

Not even bad in a good way

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Director: ANDREW L. STONE. Screenplay: Frederick Jackson, Edmund L. Hartmann. Story: Andrew L. Stone. Photography: Charles Schoenbaum. Film editor: Harvey Manger. Art director: F. Paul Sylos. Set decorator: Earl Wooden. Music: Phil Boutelje. Songs (both Havoc) by Phil Boutelje (music) and Foster Carling (lyrics): "Loved Too Little Too Late" and "Big Sombrero". Music director: Phil Boutelje. Cartoon sequence produced by Leon Schlesinger, directed by Friz Freleng. Make-up: Ted Larsen. Costumes designed by Adrian. Assistant director: Henry Kesler. Sound recording: William H. Lynch. Assistant to producer: Carley Harriman. Associate producer: Edward Finney. Producer: Andrew L. Stone.Copyright 20 August 1943 by Andrew L. Stone Productions, Inc. Released through United Artists: 20 August 1943. New York opening at the Palace: 23 September 1943. Australian release: 16 March 1944. 6,586 feet. 73 minutes. Re-issued by Astor Pictures in 1950 under the title: DIAMONDS AND CRIME.SYNOPSIS: Sailor has only 48 hours leave to get married and have his honeymoon. Alas, both events are subjected to a series of involved, if unexpected, interruptions.COMMENT: A delightfully wacky comedy that pokes fun at marriage, movies, audiences, wheeler-dealing and grand opera (amongst other subjects), breezily directed by Andrew L. Stone and most ingratiatingly played by a fine cast of professionals who know how to extract the most fun from the screwball situations. It's invidious to single out one or two, but I must compliment Adolphe Menjou and June Havoc (who make a great team) and I cannot praise Pola Negri too highly either. Barton Hepburn also contributes well beyond the call of duty to the crazy plot. The support roster bursts at the seams with a parade of our favorite character players, some of whom, like Bert Roach (trapped in a taxi- cab) and Joe Devlin (word-tangled with Mickey Finn) have never had it so good. In fact, so much laughter is generated by the movie, most of us tend to forget it's a so-called "fringe" musical which boasts two delightful songs by the sexy Miss Havoc, the first of which she kindly reprises, and the second which she deals out double-swinging by accompanying herself on a large-screen juke-box. And it's all attractively photographed, set and costumed. Production values, including a delightful surprise cartoon finale, rate as "A" plus.

Andrew Stone produced, directed and wrote the story (which was adapted by Edmund Hartmann and Frederick Jackson) for this wartime screwball comedy featuring an Academy Award nominated Score by Phil Boutelje. Also notable is the appearance of Pola Negri in the cast; this was her first film in years and her last until her final role in The Moon-Spinners (1964). Adolphe Menjou, Martha Scott, Dennis O'Keefe, Billie Burke, Walter Kingsford, and Barton Hepburn play the other significant parts in the movie.The plot is pretty standard stuff for a screwball comedy: it relies on misunderstandings among some wealthy characters - like the always reliable ditz Burke - for its comic payoffs. Menjou plays his typical womanizer, even though he's married to Negri's character, an opera singer he'd charmed six months ago for her money. Paul Porcasi plays her impresario. Menjou's son Sonny (O'Keefe) is a chip off the old block, a sailor in the Navy with a girl in every port until he meets Martha Scott, who's playing a wealthy debutante that's Burke's daughter. O'Keefe's character insists that he's never been in love like this before, a line he uses several times with other women in the film's opening credits, which include cartoon character sequences, as does the film's final scene (of operatic composer Richard Wagner and his family at a picnic!).But as is often the case, Burke's character is really smarter than she looks or acts; she and Hepburn's character have schemed to test O'Keefe's love for her daughter Scott. Burke, a rich widow who socializes with a senator played by Kingsford, pretends to lose all her money to Hepburn, who's ostensibly interested in marrying Scott for himself, in order to see if O'Keefe still wants to marry her. Naturally, their love is stronger than such concerns but, with the prospect of having to support his would-be mother-in-law Burke, O'Keefe engages his "pretending to be wealthy" father Menjou, who's a somewhat impoverished kept man of Negri's, to solve this newly financial problem of his. Menjou's plan involves using a more powerful magnet at the 59 club's (owned by Georges Metaxa's character) crooked roulette table (operated by croupier Eddie Marr) to beat them at their own game. He gets assistance from a longtime associate who's currently the club's singer, June Havoc.There's another scam involving some phony gold mine stock (wasn't there any other type of enterprise that could be used in those days?) which inadvertently fools a real brokerage firm employee (Byron Foulger) and its owner (Richard Hageman). There's also a running joke whereby Lorraine Miller appears in almost every scene (walking her dog on the street, as a hatcheck girl, etc.), noticed by Menjou and eventually labeled a friend of this film's director by Burke. Several requisite false identity gags, who's married to whom etc., also transpire which, when combined with the aforementioned schemes, nearly prevent the newlyweds time from having any alone time. But thanks to the family's maid (Ellen Lowe), O'Keefe and Scott finally get some time to consummate their marriage before he has to ship off again.

This period in American movies saw such delights as "Hellzapoppin". Here the actors bring to attention that they are playing in a film. They make faces at the audience, wallpaper comes alive, there is a woman who keeps popping up in scenes where she isn't even acting. The dialog and the plot move lightning fast and there's no time at all to waste in this pleasant and often hilarious comedy. There's a wedding reception before the wedding, fortunes earned and lost in a space of minutes, a married couple disunited throughout. What's not to like? This film has been in public domain and has been copied, often badly and on stock of poor quality, so viewer beware...

This movie presents serious problems for me. First, I couldn't stand the fact that an admitted felon, a swindler (Barton Hepburn), was wandering through the movie without anyone thinking to call the police. Not only did he swindle Billy Burke of everything, but then proceeds to disrupt everyone's life and PEOPLE LISTEN TO HIM!!! I also have no patience for Ms. Burke's as a ditz. She is capable of so much more.