It's difficult to find anything nice to say about this middling comedy starring Loretta Young and David Niven. I tried getting through it the first time but gave up after, without rhyme or reason, following a ridiculous "coup de foudre" as the French say, or love at first sight,("thunderbolt"), we find that Young and Niven are married, as if the writers were too lazy to explain how it could happen.
To make things worse, most of the film is built around hoary magic tricks that most people get tired of in high school. Why sit through a film watching them?
David Niven is always a delight to watch but, though I'm a Loretta Young fan and believe she had no equal in the 1930s and again in the 1950s (her TV show) here she looks awful in most of the film, especially at the end.
If there was a potentially sparkling comedy in this film it was in the rivalry between Niven and Broderick Crawford, cast in an unusual role. There was a genuine making of an "His Girl Friday* rivalry such as between Cary Grant and Ralph Bellamy in that film, but, unfortunately, the director missed the opportunity. Yet that's the only time when this film comes alive, often superbly.
Another problem with the film is the jaundiced moral values involved. I'm hardly a puritan but it seems unnecessarily cruel to marry someone on the rebound and then string him along until the former partner shows up again. It undermines whatever comedic intent the film had in writing such a relationship at all. If the Crawford character had cruelly blackmailed Young's character into the marriage it would have been different, and he we would have enjoyed him getting his comeuppance. But as it is we don't enjoy it at all.
As for the title song, it must be among the worst nominated songs in film history.
To make things worse, most of the film is built around hoary magic tricks that most people get tired of in high school. Why sit through a film watching them?
David Niven is always a delight to watch but, though I'm a Loretta Young fan and believe she had no equal in the 1930s and again in the 1950s (her TV show) here she looks awful in most of the film, especially at the end.
If there was a potentially sparkling comedy in this film it was in the rivalry between Niven and Broderick Crawford, cast in an unusual role. There was a genuine making of an "His Girl Friday* rivalry such as between Cary Grant and Ralph Bellamy in that film, but, unfortunately, the director missed the opportunity. Yet that's the only time when this film comes alive, often superbly.
Another problem with the film is the jaundiced moral values involved. I'm hardly a puritan but it seems unnecessarily cruel to marry someone on the rebound and then string him along until the former partner shows up again. It undermines whatever comedic intent the film had in writing such a relationship at all. If the Crawford character had cruelly blackmailed Young's character into the marriage it would have been different, and he we would have enjoyed him getting his comeuppance. But as it is we don't enjoy it at all.
As for the title song, it must be among the worst nominated songs in film history.