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As Good As It Gets

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

The flimsy story is an excuse for a wonderful parade of some of our favorite stars - some of them doing unusual or uncharacteristic things, and doing them rather well. Alan Ladd for instance joins Dorothy Lamour in singing "Tallahassee", whilst the ultra-lively Pearl Bailey has "Tired", and Gary Cooper saddles up a wooden horse on a carousel! True, there is a bit overmuch propaganda for the Variety Club for my taste and it's surprising other show-business personalities didn't object to the Club's annual banquet being turned into an all-Paramount affair. On the other hand, there's so much fun and good humor in the picture, plus of course, an inside view of Paramount Studios (very much confettied and hokied-up of course, but still more entertaining than a realistic tour of Monogram, say), that Variety Girl is hard to resist.

This was arguably the last of the 'all-star' spectaculars generated by the second world war and alas it ranks a bad nowhere to such admittedly ho hum entries as Hollywood Canteen and Thank Your Lucky Stars. On the plus side buffs will welcome the chance to see Frank Ferguson in a rare leading role and whilst it's true than many of the Paramount 'names' are wasted there is the odd moment - Ray Milland answers the phone in his dressing room by removing it from the porcelain bowl below the ceiling light and Alad Ladd reveals a pleasant singing voice in Frank Loesser's Tallahassee - it would, of course, have been a 'natural' to have seen Ladd teamed with frequent co-star Veronica Lake in something but the studio had let her go the year before. Worth a look but that's about all.

I've said this often enough. There is no way I will ever give a film like this a bad review. Just an unregenerate stargazer I guess.The demise of the studio system makes this kind of film impossible now. You couldn't possibly afford to pay all the talented people here what they would be worth on the open market. But when they're all working at Paramount studios at the time, such films are possible.The thin plot of this film is that young Mary Hatcher who back as an infant was left in a movie theater and adopted by the managers of several theaters. She became a project for them and the cause of why they founded the Variety Club Charitable Foundation.Mary's grown up now and has aspirations to be an actress. She goes to Paramount where Frank Ferguson is now a big wig. She and a goofy friend Olga San Juan get everyone confused as to who is who. Especially young DeForest Kelley who is a Paramount talent scout.Both Hatcher and Kelley were pretty unknown at the time. Hatcher had in fact come from Broadway and the original production of Oklahoma where she had replaced Joan Roberts in the lead. This was DeForest Kelley and it was only his second film. But I seem to remember he got a big break a little less than 20 years later playing a futuristic doctor on some science fiction show.But this is really just an excuse to have all the Paramount name talent strut their stuff. One interesting sequence was one where Alan Ladd hijacks an airliner and in the midst of a dramatic scene bursts into song with Dorothy Lamour about the capital city of Florida, Tallahassee. Ladd had a pleasant, if not great singing voice and I'm sure he loved the opportunity to spoof his own hardboiled image.Gary Cooper made an obligatory appearance and this turned out to be his farewell appearance with Paramount, the studio that discovered and developed him.Of course heading the cast were the two that really kept Paramount in the black in those days, Bing Crosby and Bob Hope. Bing was in the midst of a five year run as the nation's number one box office attraction. And in 1949 he would be succeeded by one Bob Hope. They have a duet called Harmony in which the rest of the cast joins in at the finale.Curiously enough Bing only recorded Tallahassee and with the Andrews Sisters. Why he and Hope didn't do Harmony on record is a mystery to me.Just about everyone on the lot but Betty Hutton got into this one. I wonder where she was?

There's plenty of stars in this homage to Variety clubs international but precious little entertainment. A poor script and shoddy production values make this movie look as though it was shot over weekends on whatever sets happened to be available. Painful to sit through at times with dated comedy routines that were probably not very funny even at the time. Of the performers Pearl Bailey does a not bad musical number, and Bing Crosby and Bob Hope come the closest to being funny.