The Muppet Movie

The Muppet Movie
June 22, 1979
Henson Associates
Children's, Comedy, Musical
DVD
B-

I'll always have a soft spot for this first of what would become many Muppet movies, this one released when I was eleven.  Yet I will admit that it's not as good as I remembered.  One of its strengths is also its greatest weakness.  There are lots of celebrity cameos, some of whom I've tagged, but most of these people aren't given much to do.  After all, if you're going to cast Richard Pryor, can't you give him something funnier to do than sell balloons to Gonzo?  Even the Muppets, and there are many of them, are for the most part not being used to their full potential.

In fact, the best sequences are mostly in the first half hour, with either Kermit on his own, singing the still lovable "Rainbow Connection" and (still impressive) riding a bicycle, or singing and joking with Fozzie.  (My favorite quote is later though: "Bear left," "Right, frog.")  As they pick up more passengers, the energy diffuses.  (Unlike in James Frawley's Big Bus.)  There are moments here and there, like the psychedelic painting of the Studebaker, and the always wonderful voice of Orson Welles, but not enough to quite put this in the good, let alone great, category.

Charles Durning is Doc Hopper, while Austin Pendleton, who plays his assistant Max, was Fred the Professor (the one who gets Jackie Gleason among others high) in Skidoo.  Muppet performer Robert Payne was in Beach Party, back when he was known as Bobby.  Twenty-year-old Tim Burton (yes, that Tim Burton) was an uncredited Muppet performer.  Tommy Madden, who's One-Eyed Midget, was a hospital visitor in Rabbit Test.  H. B. Haggerty, who's a lumberjack here, would be Awful Abdul in Million Dollar Mystery.  If you haven't seen the movie before (or it's been awhile), I'll let you spot the rest of the cameos.

The second and the second-best song, "Movin' Right Along"

Cancel My Reservation

Cancel My Reservation
September 21, 1972
Naho/Warner Bros.
Comedy, Mystery
VHS
C

Louis L'Amour wrote the novel that this Southwest mystery was based on, with the less Hope-ful title of The Broken Gun.  I can only imagine what Dominic Frontiere would've done with that, since he sings the Jackson-5ish "Cancel My Reservation" over both opening and closing credits.  Bob H was pushing 70 at this point, but his character is supposed to be 42, and he's paired with 48-year-old Eva Marie Saint, who looks stunning.  (And she shows off a lot of skin for a middle-aged woman, including in hot pants.)  The two of them are unhappily married because she's a women's libber whose "own thing" is becoming co-star on his talk show.  (They interview a pre-Happy-Days Pat Morita as a karate expert.)  Even though he doesn't seem to like children (he says that two rude autograph-seekers, one played by the director's daughter, at the airport are a good argument for the Pill), she blames herself that they haven't had any kids.  The happy ending, after he's several times arrested and they both come close to dying, before he finally solves the mystery, is she's pregnant and can leave the show.  Even though she told "Crazy" (Anne Archer) that she hated being stuck at home while her husband went off to work, she seems pleased about this.

As for the mystery, it includes Forrest Tucker and Ralph Bellamy as villains, some Indian land rights, and a few murders.  Keenan Wynn plays the local sheriff, and Chief Dan George a really old Indian.  I haven't read the book, so I don't know how much of this was added by co-adapters Bob Fisher and Arthur Marx, who'd teamed up for I'll Take Sweden.  I am fairly sure though that the joke, "I'll come back for my stomach later," when Bob is on the back of a motorcycle is a direct self-steal from Sweden.  And I suspect L'Amour did not include a rape joke.  (Eva MS, upon finding out that the Indian girl Bob H is accused of killing wasn't raped, says, "And that gets you off the hook with me.")  The movie is of course sexist and racist, although I suppose it could be worse.  It's incredibly dated, even for its time (the Twiggy joke for instance), and the cameos of Bing, John Wayne, Johnny Carson, and Flip Wilson are only slightly better than those in Birds Do It.  (At least they're given lines, although not good ones.)  Oh, and this time Herb Vigran plays Roscoe Snagby.

The movie isn't dreadful but it doesn't even have the camp appeal of Hope's '60s comedies.  It's just sort of there.  I guess see it if you're curious and/or a completist.

This is somewhat the chronological midpoint of this project, since I started with 1929 and I'm unlikely to finish before next year.  At the moment, I don't own any movies from after 2012, but that will probably change before I'm through.

Points for correct use of "whom"

How to Commit Marriage

How to Commit Marriage
July 7, 1969
Naho Productions
Comedy, Musical
VHS
C+

While this has the potential to be as entertainingly bad as Gleason's Skidoo, although a more mainstream take on hippie culture, it never quite gets there.  I'm just guessing, but director Norman Panama probably didn't drop acid for research purposes, as Preminger did.  Not that this movie makes much more sense than Skidoo.  

As briefly as can I put it:  Bob Hope and Jane Wyman are going to tell their Berkeley-freshman-but-wholesome daughter played by the future TV Isis that they're getting a divorce, when she announces that she's engaged to Berkeley-senior-but-wholesome Tim Matheson (then spelling his last name Matthieson).  Like Frankie Avalon in I'll Take Sweden, he's an unemployed musician, but he composes classical.  Tim's father, Jackie Gleason, produces rock groups like the Comfortable Chair (as themselves) and is cynical about marriage and everything else.  The young folks' call off their wedding when Gleason reveals the truth about Isis's parents' marriage.  They decide to live together out of marriage, which leads to them joining the Comfortable Chair and becoming unwed parents.  Gleason bribes Prof. Irwin Corey, as a guru, to tell them to give up their baby for adoption.  Gleason's assistant, Paul Stewart (Raymond in Citizen Kane), is tricked by Hope and Wyman into thinking they're strangers, and Scottish, so they adopt the baby with seemingly no red tape.  Gleason gets suspicious, so he makes a chimp beat the golf pants off Hope.  Hope and Wyman meanwhile dress mod, bicker, and date Maureen Arthur and Leslie Nielsen respectively, but end up getting remarried in the end.  Isis and Tim get married, too, as do Gleason and Tina Louise.  Gleason and Hope, who've spent most of the movie exchanging unfunny insults, get caught in a mudslide a year later.  THE END.  No, there is no title song.

This is the last of my movies with Kenner G. Kemp, who was in Singin' the Rain among others; here he plays a race track extra.  Don Brodie, who plays Pevney, would be a gasoline attendant in Escape to Witch Mountain.

Boy, Did I Get a Wrong Number!

Boy, Did I Get a Wrong Number!
June 8, 1966
United Artists
Comedy
VHS
C+

This time around Bob isn't so much worried about his children's potential sex lives (since they're younger than Tuesday was in I'll Take Sweden, and they're more interested in onscreen than real-life sexiness).  Instead, Phyllis Diller, as Hope's wacky maid, is worried about Bob's possible adultery with Elke Sommer as a French [sic] bathing beauty.  Diller of course steals most of the scenes she's in, especially when she's rocking out in the kitchen to a song that has lyrics like "Murder me with kisses," or tearing down the (allegedly rural Oregonian) roadway on her motorcycle.  Hope actually has more scenes with her, due to the plot twists, than he does with his wife, played by Marjorie Lord in a towering bouffant that has dated far worse than Phyllis's sort of proto-new-wave egg-beatered look.  Speaking of being dated, if you ever wanted to hear Bob Hope say, "I've got more fuzz on my tail than a French poodle," this is the film for you.  I'd go with a B-, like I'll Take Sweden, but I don't like the way that Sommer is treated onscreen.  Yes, her character is immature, but she does go through mistreatment, from getting exploited and lied to by her fiance/director (Cesare Danova) to getting locked in a spider-filled cellar, and we're just supposed to laugh and think she deserves it.

Joyce Jameson, who as the telephone operator is sort of responsible for the title situation, was "The Blonde" in The Apartment.  (I think the one who sounded like Marilyn Monroe.)  Arthur Tovey, who had a bit part in Dear Brigitte, is an onlooker at the soap factory and would work his way up to Hotel Guest in The Graduate.  Norman Leavitt, who's Titus Zeale, Gas Station Proprietor, would be Herbert the Ice Cream Vendor in The Swinger.  Keith Taylor, who plays Plympton, would be Henry in The Perils of Pauline (1967).



This completes the first 100 of my movies I've reviewed.  The breakdown on grades is 1 A, 3 A-s, 9 B+s, 12 B's, 26 B-s, 29 C+s, 10 C's, 8 C-s, 1 D+, and 1 D-.  Given my tastes, Comedy is the most popular of the overlapping genres, 82%.  Groucho Marx has more appearances than anyone, 14, and he's not quite finished.  Paramount is the most popular studio, with 18% of the movies, although this is less the case for the '50s and '60s than for earlier.

I'll Take Sweden

I'll Take Sweden
June 18, 1965
United Artists
Comedy, Musical, Romance
VHS
B-

If it's Tuesday, this must be Sweden.  Or maybe Big Bear.  In Hope & Weld's answer to Take Her, She's Mine, we have to take the mountains of California for the mountains of Sweden.  Somehow that seems appropriate in this movie that is on the surface much less topical than THSM, yet underneath shows the tensions of the growing generation gap.  Sandra Dee as a college student was interested in protest, but Weld (as Jojo) just cares about the Watusi and her unemployed musician boyfriend Kenny (Frankie Avalon).  Hope (as Bob Holcomb, a very Danza name) lies and schemes to separate the two of them when marriage is a possibility, but he later decides that a wholesome American boy like Kenny is a better bet than the "Scandinavian Svengali" who tries to seduce Jojo.  Although the movie is as L7 as Bob H., it does address the double standard, especially when Bob falls for a Swede of his own (Dina Merrill, not Swedish).  There are at least three lines that show that the worry is not only that Jojo will lose her virginity out of wedlock, but that she'll become an unwed mother.  The irony of this will be great when we get to Hope's How to Commit Marriage, but that will be four years later, in a decade of change too fast for mainstream movies like this to keep up with.

The movie is sometimes intentionally funny, if in a corny way.  ("I can't sleep at night."  "You should talk to my doctor.  He can't sleep either.")  There's a third-rate, secondhand Marx Brothers connection, since director Nat Perrin wrote The Big Store.  And Bob Fisher and Arthur (son of Groucho) Marx would also cowrite Hope's Cancel My Reservation.  (Seven years from this movie, and definitely showing weariness with changing times.)

I'll note that Frankie sings three songs in this one, but doesn't seem to be breaking completely free of his AIP image.  (Bob calls him "a poor Beatle.")  Frankie's work here did have an impact on our next movie, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, but I'll get to that in its place.

John Qualen, who's Olaf here, was Berger in Casablanca.  This is the last of my movies with Bert Stevens (he died the previous December); here he's a bistro patron, and he was in Citizen Kane among many others.  Hotel guest Jack Shea was a police officer in Palm Springs Weekend.  Rosemarie Frankland, here Marti, was a showgirl in A Hard Day's Night.  Christopher Riordan, a student here, would join the AIP Beach Party crowd shortly.  Beverly Hills (yes, you read that right) plays Electra here and would be Mary Ann in Speedway.

Road to Morocco

Road to Morocco
April 8, 1943
Paramount
Comedy, Musical
DVD
B-

While this isn't as funny as I remember, it still has its moments.  Yes, it's probably as politically incorrect as Road to Zanzibar, but it has a much lighter touch, and at least there's no cannibalism.  David Butler also directed Playmates, and he's good at blending silly music with a silly plot, as well as lots of then-topical references, e.g. Here Comes Mr. Jordan.  The title song is one of my favorites ever, and even as a kid I delighted in these lyrics:  "Like a complete set of Shakespeare that you buy in the corner drugstore for a dollar ninety-eight/ We're Morocco bound/ Or/ Like a volume of Omar Khayyam that you buy in the department store at Christmas time for your cousin Julia/ We're Morocco bound."

There's more fourth-wall-breaking than in Zanzibar, with that title song referencing Dorothy Lamour and Paramount.   Bing's solos are very good, too, and I like the reprise of "Moonlight Becomes You" done by the trio, with shifting voices!  We've got the usual romantic triangle, but this time Bob gets a great alternate girl: cute, affectionate, and brave Dona Drake.  There's also Anthony Quinn as Lamour's rejected fiance.  And Bob & Bing have a bromance that involves accidental kissing.  There are moments that I'm surprised got past the censors, like Bob saying the word "reefers," and Dorothy's kisses uncurling the toes of Bob's shoes.  (Bing suggests she try kissing his nose and straightening that.)  I really like the sets and costumes.  So why not a higher grade?  Well, there is that political incorrectness, not just about Arabs (much more than in Casablanca) but about "village idiots."  Some of the other jokes bomb, too.  Still, the movie is worth seeing.

Harry Woods, who was gangster Alky Briggs in Monkey Business, is unconfirmed as being in this movie.  Leo Belasco, Monte Blue, Dick Botiller, and Jamiel Hasson were all in Casablanca, which is fitting since Casablanca is in Morocco.  Vivian Dandridge sang in A Day at the Races, and she plays a servant here.  (She's also the voice of "So White" in 1943's infamous cartoon Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs, talk about politically incorrect!)  James Dime was in Go West.  Suzanne Ridgeway was in Citizen Kane and would go on to It's a Wonderful Life.

Road to Zanzibar

Road to Zanzibar
April 11, 1941
Paramount
Comedy, Musical
VHS
C

I used to watch the Road to... movies on TV a lot as a kid, but I never owned any until a few months ago, when I saw this tape for less than $1.  This is the first I've watched the movie as an adult and, well, it hasn't aged well.  It starts out all right, with Bob & Bing bantering.  But I didn't like that everyone in the movie is immoral, with Bing manipulating best friend Bob, and Dorothy Lamour (as Donna Latour) tricking both of them, while planning to marry for money, and lots of other scheming going on throughout, including Donna's pal Julia tricking "the boys" when Donna seems to be sold in the slave market.  If this was meant to be a dark comedy, I mean a black comedy-- Oh dear.  The other big problem is this is set in Africa (they never actually get to Zanzibar), and the "natives" are stereotyped, especially the cannibal tribe that Bob & Bing meet.  Yes, it's possible this is all a parody, but it's not a funny one.  The wall-breaking jokes are better, as when the pattycake routine is anticipated and Bob says, "They must've seen the picture," i.e. Road to Singapore, the first in the series.  This one isn't terrible, but I can recommend it just to Hope and/or Crosby completists.  (Lamour fans will like the scene where she's wearing only leaves.)  That said, when I got this tape, I decided to spring for the Road to Morocco DVD.  It was my favorite of the series when I was a kid, and when I saw it as an adult a few years ago, I still enjoyed it.  (Not that it's not without its own problems, but we'll get to that.)

Eric Blore was headwaiter in Flying Down to Rio, and often played servants, so it's odd to see him as a rich man here.  Paul Porcasi was also in Flying Down, and would soon appear in Casablanca, as would Norma Varden. Joan Marsh, who plays Dimples, the Human Cannonball act assistant, was Pauline Bisbee in You're Telling Me.  Another of Fields's onscreen daughters, Una Merkel from the recent The Bank Dick, has a much larger role, as Julia.  Buck Woods, who portrays jungle guide Thonga, was a singer in A Day at the Races, which also featured Robert Middlemass.  Charles Gemora was often a gorilla, as in At the Circus.  Georges Renavent was Mr. Ram in Turnabout.  Ed Bridge would go on to The Miracle of Morgan's Creek.  Iris Adrian was recently in Go West and would much later appear in Freaky Friday.