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As Good As It Gets

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Associate producer: William Jacobs. Copyright 19 September 1942 by Warner Brothers Pictures, Inc. A Warner Brothers-First National picture. New York opening at the Palace: 24 September 1942. U.S. release: 18 August 1942. Australian release: 21 February 1946 (sic). 5,403 feet. 58 minutes.SYNOPSIS: A Nazi agent attempts to place a bomb on a bus.NOTES: Film debut of Eleanor Parker . COMMENT: It's hard to believe that this wonderfully suspenseful, well-produced "B" thriller comes from the hand of D. Ross Lederman, not exactly a giant in the art of creative film-making. However, it's been well said that even the lowliest Hollywood hack has the makings of at least one really good movie. And in point of fact, Mr. Lederman has actually brought out at least two (1943's "Adventure in Iraq" is the other contender I have in mind), maybe even three or four. Of course, for this one he did have a tautly solid script to start with, and a really professional cast to enact its interesting characters. Julie Bishop figures both most convincingly yet sympathetically in the lead as the stranded girl, whilst the support players led by Eleanor Parker, Willie Best, George Meeker and the personable Richard Travis, hover around her ingratiatingly. What's even more important is that the plot comes to an all-action climax abetted by skillful editing and first-rate special effects. This is probably a good place to answer a question some readers have been asking me: Why am I including "B" movies in my reviews on IMDb? Such films surely had no chance whatever of earning praise from critics, let alone winning any awards? Wrong! Quite a few "B" movies were nominated for awards and in 1956 "Marty" (a "B" movie if ever there was one) even won Hollywood's major awards for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, and Best Screenplay!

Except for the stereotypical portrayal that Willie Best does in Buses Roar of the misspelled title, the film is a typical wartime propaganda film, just some fodder for the homefront morale. This concerns a rather inept bunch of saboteurs, a joint German-Japanese operation to blow up a bus.This is not a terrorist act per se, the idea is to plant a bomb on a bus and detonate when it's near some undisclosed valuable wartime site. The passengers would be considered collateral damage in today's terms.The film marked Eleanor Parker's feature film debut though she's billed fourth in the cast as a bus ticket agent who has a couple of drivers panting hot and heavy for her. The real stars are Richard Travis and Julie Bishop as a marine on leave and a woman who's hoping to charm the price of a ticket out of San Diego.The saboteurs who are led by Peter Whitney make three different attempts to get the bomb on the bus. Law enforcement isn't to swift either in this comedy of errors.Still the film has a certain charm to it, sad it had to include Willie Best at his worst.

Probably the most racial and gender stereotypes per foot of film than any other film. Something to offend everyone. Even making allowances for the early WWII hysteria it comes across poorly. One feels that the film makers weren't taking themselves seriously. There is a really gross jumpcut in one scene. Rather than try to hide it, the composer actually put a music sting on it. Maybe everyone thought they needed to do the film for the war effort.

This is a most enjoyable movie,catching the spirit of the enemy as depicted by Hollywood in early WWII. Such a movie would be "politically incorrect" these days, as would "Outrages of the Orient" which I recently purchased. I remembered it from childhood, but found it now to be trashy compared to "Buses Roar".