Dr. Cyclops (1940)

A mad scientist (Albert Dekker) with failing eyesight requests assistance from more mainstream (less mad) scientists. Three people make the arduous trek to his remote lab in the Amazon jungle and he asks them what they see in his microscope. After which, he thanks them and tells them to leave. They refuse to go, so he shrinks them to doll size.

The first thing to notice is the vocal style, specifically with Drs. Thorkel and Bullfinch. They speak in a stilted, awkwardly formal cadence. I'm guessing they didn't want the viewers to forget they were watching a B sci-fi flick.

Thomas Coley plays substitute Bill, whose presence on the excursion and in the movie remains a mystery. My only guess is there needed to be a young man to accompany the pretty scientist lady. This was his first screen credit and last feature film appearance. He had a large number of TV appearances starting eleven years after this film’s release. I’m sure his acting improved.

The first sci-fi film shot in three-strip Technicolor, it earned an Oscar nomination for special effects. And for good reason. The oversized sets match seamlessly with the regular sized ones. My only criticism is that footage of our heroes when small was much sharper than the enlarged rear projection. Other than that, the effects were quite good.

I had never heard of Dr. Cyclops prior to recording it, but it delivered on all promises. The science element here is wonky as all hell, but it’s without a doubt the best mad-scientist-shrinks-people-to-doll-size film I’ve seen so far. AMRU 3.5.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)

A young lawyer (James Stewart) from the East is robbed by the villainous Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Taken in by townsfolk, he plots a way to stop Valance without resorting to guns and violence. That doesn’t work out too great.

The story is told almost entirely in flashback with an elderly Ransom Stoddard (Stewart), now a senator, telling reporters the story of Tom Doniphon (John Wayne) at his funeral. The mystery of who actually shot Valance (the tenderfoot Stoddard or veteran gunfighter Doniphon) plays out well.

Wayne (54) and Stewart (53) compete for the affection of Vera Miles (31), revealing that the actors were much older than their characters. Not an uncommon occurrence for the Duke. Lee Marvin was recommended by Wayne after they worked on The Comancheros (1961) together, and he makes for an especially villainous villain.

The Man who Shot Liberty Valance is an entertaining tale, if not truly engrossing. It is considered one of John Ford’s latter masterpieces and did well at the box office. I found it a little better than watchable. AMRU 3.

Zero Hour! (1957)

Because a former war pilot (Dana Andrews) can’t get past a raid he led that went wrong, his wife leaves him. Despite being terrified to fly, he buys a ticket on her flight. When the pilot and co-pilot become incapacitated with serious food poisoning, our hero has to step up and land the plane.

Sound familiar? This is exactly the plot of Airplane! (1980), and that’s exactly why I watched it. Jim Abrahams and the Zucker brothers essentially remade Zero Hour! but with jokes. If you are as familiar with the classic ZAZ comedy as I am, you will spot every setup to every joke. I had to see it.

Pretty Linda Darnell plays Dana’s estranged wife. She seemed very familiar but I haven’t seen anything she was in. She would die in a house fire at age 41. Elroy ‘Crazylegs’ Hirsch, the just-retired star wide receiver for the NFL Rams, plays the sickened pilot. Gruff Sterling Hayden plays the gruff Captain Treleaven.

Despite its reputation as a forgettable aviation drama, Zero Hour! isn’t that bad. Perhaps not great but better than its reputation. Rotten Tomatoes gives it some disrespect. And if you have seen Airplane!, you by and large have already seen Zero Hour! But give it a watch anyhow. ASMR 3.5.

The Big Clock (1948)

A chance encounter with his boss’ mistress leads to a crime reporter (Ray Milland) having to solve a murder where he is the prime suspect.

This is a difficult film to sum up both accurately and without spoilers. Our hero knows, or strongly suspects, who the murderer is, but that’s not where the evidence points. He frantically scrambles around trying to cover his tracks and collect evidence, while not tipping off the culprit or angering his wife.

The heartless boss is played to perfection by Charles Laughton. Wife Elsa Lanchester has a small but memorable role. Old friend Harry Morgan is quite menacing as a hired thug. He has no lines. OG Jane Maureen O’Sullivan is the reporter’s long suffering wife. IRL she was married to director John Farrow, parents of Mia.

Based on the Kenneth Fearing novel of the same name, the film added one element not present in the book: a big clock. In the book, the clock is just a metaphor, perhaps as a thinly veiled critique of Time Magazine, Fearing’s longtime employer. Time gave the book and the film glowing reviews.

The Big Clock is a better than fair crime thriller with some excellent performances. And it was a satisfying way for me to round out Noirvember. AMRU 4.

Friday the 13th (1980)

Camp counselors hired to reopen a troubled summer camp are killed off one by one by an unseen assailant. Sh sh sh sh sh sh sh, ha ha ha ha ha ha.

I was too young to see the Halloween / Friday the 13th / Evil Dead generation of slashers when they were released, and really had no interest. It was the Guy in a Rubber Suit subgenre that interested me. Truth be told, I didn’t like being frightened. Maybe it was because I was somehow allowed to see Alien (1979). Not gonna lie, that film messed me up for a long time.

Friday the 13th is refreshingly free of subtext or narrative. It has been accused of being misogynistic but I don’t see it. If there is a deeper meaning, it’s that if you are hit in the face with an axe, you’re gonna die. Spoiler alert.

The biggest surprise is that there is no Jason in a Hockey Mask. That’s apparently a Part 2 invention. Also, Kevin Bacon is one of the counselors. Another was played by Harry Crosby, Bing’s kid. He has a total of five acting credits.

Friday the 13th is inextricably linked to Halloween, and widely recognized to be the lesser of the two films. That may be so, but I found myself enjoying it. Citizen Kane it is not, much of the acting is rather poor, but it gets a passing grade. AMRU 3.

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)

Young Martha Ivers (Janis Wilson) hates her domineering aunt (Judith Anderson) and in a fit of rage kills her. Years later, adult Martha (Barbara Stanwyck) is a successful business owner married to a childhood friend (Kirk Douglas), who knows her secret. When another childhood friend (Van Heflin) returns after many years, the couple conclude he is there to negotiate a price for his silence.

This is the first ever film role for Douglas as a scared little boy, quite against what would later become his type. This is the second appearance of Lizabeth Scott, playing the good but not too good girl. Judith Anderson is great as the Judith Anderson character. See Laura (1944) and Rebecca (1940). It’s a shame she didn’t have more screen time. Stanwyck reportedly exercised a lot of control on the set, perhaps realizing that her career was at an inflection point. She would turn the big four-oh a year later.

This film was adapted from a short story titled Love Lies Bleeding, which is a pretty awesome title. There are at least four other unrelated films with that title. I couldn’t find box office numbers but Strange Love apparently was a success despite the Strange Title.

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers is an interesting story that perhaps takes a little too long to resolve itself. Back in the day Noir films were simply called melodramas, and this film gets more than a little melodramatic. AMRU 3.5

Speedy (1928)

Dreamer Harold ‘Speedy’ Swift (Harold Lloyd) works in a malt shop, visits Coney Island, becomes a taxi driver, meets Babe Ruth, and saves his girl’s grandfather’s horse-drawn trolley business.

The trolley story line, ostensibly the film’s premise, doesn’t show up until about the half way point. Like most of his films, the rest is an excuse for Lloyd to perform his comedic bits and pad it out to 85 minutes. His propensity to lose his job facilitates his gags and explains his free time. The Coney Island section has a number of clever bits. At one point he gives his image in a fun mirror the middle finger. Apparently that was allowed back then.

Thugs want Grandpa’s trolley route and modernize it with electricity. They can do this if Grandpa fails to run his route. It’d be an awful shame if something unfortunate happened. The Babe is late for a game so it’s taxi driver Speedy to the rescue. I understand that Lou Gehrig can be seen in a crowd at some point, but I missed him.

Speedy is an effective, if disjointed, silent comedy. I don’t find Harold Lloyd as inventive as Buster Keaton nor as emotionally impactful as Charlie Chaplin, but he knew how to please an audience. AMRU 3.5.

The Shootist (1976)

An aging gunfighter (or “shootist”, if you will) receives a bad prognosis and heads to Carson City to die. As people discover his identity, and his situation, a peaceful end was no longer in the cards.

A 69 year old John Wayne plays 50 year old JB Brooks, and 51 year old Lauren Bacall is his 40ish landlord. This wouldn’t be a problem except both leads already looked older than their stated ages. Even 68 year old James Stewart looked 80 plus. Ron Howard was about 21 playing a teenager. This isn’t a big knock but it was a distraction.

A bigger knock are the uneven performances. Harry Morgan just couldn’t deliver his lines with any conviction. That may say more about the lines than him, but they didn’t really work. Stewart, coaxed out of retirement, looked off of his game. And Ron Howard is apparently a terrible actor.

That all said, it’s a pretty interesting story. Also interesting is the story that Wayne, dying of cancer, chose this film to be his last to go out on. Unfortunately that story is also fiction. I understand that the Duke wasn’t diagnosed for another three years. However when pitching the film on Johnny, he did allude to a cancer diagnosis. Either way, it’s not why he wanted to do the film and he never intended it to be his last.

The Shootist was an interesting watch. Wayne’s performance was rather naturalistic and a refreshing change from his regular stock character style. A worthwhile watch, despite its flaws. AMRU 3.5.

This Gun for Hire (1942)

A hired killer (Alan Ladd) is double-crossed and sets out for revenge. Pretty Ellen (Veronica Lake) is caught in the middle. World War II propaganda is shoehorned in.

Here is the second of seven films that paired Ladd and Lake. Ladd was a talented actor with leading man good looks, but at only 5’6” there were few leading ladies he could play opposite. Lake, at 5’2” or shorter, fit the profile. Here they are not a romantic pair, Lake’s Ellen was with Detective Crane (Robert Preston).

A box office success, This Gun for Hire made Ladd a star, affording him the opportunity to take hero roles. Friends but not romantic in real life, Ladd and Lake had much in common. Both struggled with substance abuse and died at fifty.

Life has been (and will continue to be) busy, so it has been about a month since I saw this film. I did enjoy it but I had to do some reading to refresh my memory. Perhaps that in itself isn’t a great sign, but I did like it.. Anyhow, AMRU 3.5.

A Foreign Affair (1948)

A Senate committee travels to post-war Berlin to investigate stories of lax attitudes and inappropriate behavior by US servicemen. Among them is the young Congresswoman Frost (Jean Arthur). She sees our boys buying goods on the black market and chasing German women, but when she learns that someone has been covering for a cabaret singer (Marlene Dietrich) with a Nazi link, she is determined to uncover the truth. She enlists the help of fellow Iowan Captain Pringle (John Lund). Will love bloom?

It’s not a spoiler to reveal that it’s Cap Pringle who’s been covering for singer Von Schluetow. And Cap makes for a pretty poor romantic lead. Our introduction to him is pretty rough and it doesn’t get better. But this is Billy Wilder and he knows how to spin a tale.

Squeaky little Jean Arthur took four years off from filmmaking, and would wait another five for her last film, Shane. She was very charming as the naive and uptight Senator. She and rival Dietrich were both pushing fifty, very unusual for a film of this time. Dietrich, true to form, didn’t think much of her co-stars. She referred to Lund as a piece of petrified wood and Arthur as “that ugly, ugly woman with that terrible American twang". She never did play nice.

So, did A Foreign Affair stick the landing? More or less, I would say. From a story and dialog perspective, it’s not top Wilder. But it’s not too bad either. Good performances (particularly if you like Dietrich’s singing) and the footage of bombed out Berlin were quite striking. AMRU 3.

We’re No Angels (1955)

Three escapes from Devil’s Island prison (Humphrey Bogart, Peter Ustinov, and Aldo Ray) hide out on the island waiting for a chance to sneak aboard a steamship to freedom. In the meantime they meet the Ducotel family who run a general store, whom they plan to rob blind. The family trusts the men, although it’s unclear why, and the men begin to like the family. Cousin Andre (Basil Rathbone) proves harder to like.

Similar to 3 Godfathers, we again have three criminals learn the true meaning of Christmas and become good people. Instead of wise men, our three are analogs of the three archangels, even watching the family from up on high. But as Bogart’s Joseph says, “we’re no angels”. And they’re not.

Joan Bennett came out of scandal-induced retirement to play the Ducotel matriarch. Leo G. Carroll is over a barrel as shop owner Felix Ducotel. Pretty Gloria Talbott (The Cyclops) is their fainting-prone daughter. Peter Ustinov is a name I am quite familiar with but may have heard him more than seen. At 55 he played the 'Old Man' in Logan’s Run. His distinct line delivery was quite interesting.

I did not pick up on the screwball tone of We’re No Angels at first. When Mom Ducotel finds her daughter unconscious in the arms of a convict, I would expect her to have some follow-up questions, but we saw what happened and she believes their explanation without question. They are the main characters, after all. Once I accepted these things, it was quite enjoyable. AMRU 3.5.

“We came here to rob them and that's what we're gonna do - beat their heads in, gouge their eyes out, cut their throats. Soon as we wash the dishes."

Going My Way (1944)

A young and carefree priest (Bing Crosby) is assigned to be assistant at the troubled St. Dominic’s Church, but his methods run afoul of father Fitzgibbon (Barry Fitzgerald). I wonder if music will somehow solve the church’s problems.

Recorded a year ago under the impression that it was a Christmas movie (it is not), I watched it early because my cable provider is deleting stuff off my DVR. I will rant on this during my year end wrap up. A friend of Bing’s Father Chuck is Genevieve, star of the New York Metropolitan Opera. She is played by Risë Stevens, star of the New York Metropolitan Opera. Would-be church for-closer is played by Gene Lockhart.

There is an interesting situation where the neighbors, police, clergy, and landlord all become suspicious of a young woman’s life arrangements. At eighteen she essentially ran away from home to become independent, but her moral turpitude comes into question. Won’t some decent man make an honest woman out of here? By which I mean a housewife. This is just one of those prevalent social conventions that disappeared by century’s end.

Going My Way does not appear to have too much going for it, but you become dragged into their world. Father Chuck’s earnestness, Father Fitzgibbon’s quirkiness, and the people who surround them are all very engaging. It’s little surprise that the film won … seven Oscars?!?! Ok, that is a little surprising. In addition to Best Picture, it earned statues for both Bing and Barry, director, original story, screenplay, and song. Fitzgerald was nominated for both lead and supporting actor.

Accolades aside, it's an excellent film and a very pleasant watch. You are caught up in the story and are left satisfied. AMRU 3.5. But it’s no Double Indemnity and certainly no Laura.

Shane (1953)

An ex-gunfighter (Alan Ladd) crosses paths with a homesteading family that is being bullied by a wealthy rancher. He decides to hang around to help.

Shane leans hard into the myth of the old west, while getting a surprising amount right. Conflict between ranchers and farmers was a real thing. Despite the vastness of the landscape, resources (grazing pastures and water in particular) were scarce. Gone is the quaint and clean old west town. Life was harsh. The trope of the good gunfighter against the evil gunslinger, however, is readily apparent. The “Man’s gotta do” philosophy is a prevalent theme.

Jean Arthur came out of retirement as a favor to friend director George Stevens to play the homesteader’s trusty wife. The unspoken sexual tension between her and Ladd’s Shane was palpable. It was borderline scandalous, this being a very kid friendly picture. Eliza Cook Jr. is a pint-sized blow-hard and Ellen Corby (Grandma Walton) is his wife. Jack Palance is wonderfully evil as the gunslinger.

Ten year old Brandon De Wilde played Joey, the boy that idolizes Shane. He was nominated for an Academy Award for his performance. Brandon embarked on a productive, if not stellar Hollywood career, also appearing in Hud. That career, however, was tragically cut short when he crashed his camper van on his way to visit his wife in the hospital. He was just thirty.

Shane was an iconic novel and is also an iconic film. The tension felt by the characters contrasts greatly from the optimistic and somewhat comedic tone of the John Wayne western. Something of a slow burn, it is a well paced and a very well made film. AMRU 4.

“A man has to be what he is, Joey. Can't break the mould. I tried it and it didn't work for me.”

El Dorado (1966)

Bad guy Bart (Ed Asner) tries to hire gunfighter Cole (John Wayne) to assist in stealing the MacDonald clan’s water, but Cole decides to take sides with his good buddy J.P. (Robert Mitchum), the drunken sheriff of El Dorado. After arresting Black Bart, our heroes hold up in the town jail while Bart’s gang threatens to make trouble.

El Dorado bears more than a passing familiarity with Rio Bravo, both directed by Howard Hawks. He denied this was a remake, and the inciting incidents differ, but the situation is identical and there is a one to one correlation between the principal characters of the two films.

Lou Grant playing the heavy was quite strange, but the role suited him. A young James Caan played the Ricky Nelson character. Arthur Hunnicutt (playing the Walter Brennan character) was actually three years younger than Wayne. Love interest Charlene Holt was slightly closer to Wayne’s age than Angie Dickinson. Wayne was uncomfortable about the age gap in the earlier film.

The internal logic of traditional westerns can be pretty bonkers, this being a prime example. Bart is taken into custody because he is responsible for a non-lethal shooting, but the many other killings go completely unremarked. Our heroes must hide in the jail because it is too dangerous for them to venture out, even for food, until the story requires it. The grizzled Indian fighter uses a crossbow for stealth, but carries a bugle to announce the attack. And Cole uses his guns like Homer Simpson in that one episode.

El Dorado isn’t a terribly original film, and it doesn't help that it closely resembles a much better film. And it was something of a throwback at the time. Remember, this was contemporary to the Dollars trilogy. But that’s not to say it’s not enjoyable. It was box office success. Hawks and Wayne deliver, Chinese impression, aside. AMRU 3.5.

Design for Living (1933)

Two friends, an artist (Gary Cooper) and a playwright (Frederic March), meet a pretty woman (Miriam Hopkins) on a train and proceed to fall in love. Unable to choose between them, she decides they should all live together. Only no sex.

Pre-code films can be, in addition to other things, pretty risque. And when it comes to risque dialog, Design for Living just may be the pre-codiest. It begins with Hopkins' Gilda (pronounced Jilda) suggestively placing her legs between those of the sleeping men, and it escalates from there. Many times pre-code films will gratuitously show the lead actress undress down to a fairly unrevealing nightgown or make a sly comment about sex, and it wouldn't even hit my radar. But the dialog in Design for Living was downright scandalous.

Based on a Noel Coward play, it was reportedly rewritten by Ben Hecht, retaining only one line. But the sharp dialog is the highlight here. Several changes were made to get it past the Hays office, but it would be denied a certificate for re-release in subsequent years.

Playing Gilda's boss is distinctive character actor Edward Everett Horton. He has shown up in a variety of 1930's films. Frequently an unlikable if not villainous character, he is always memorable. The bulk of his film roles were prior to 1950 but he continued to work until his death in 1970.

Design for Living is a surprisingly entertaining watch and perhaps my favorite Gary Cooper performance. Miriam Hopkins was deviously adorable and I loved every minute of it. AMRU 4.5.

"For the good of our immortal souls!"

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965)

After yet another cold war informant is executed, a British operative (Richard Burton) goes on one last mission. He offers carefully crafted information for sale to the East that will incriminate his adversary. Not everything goes to plan.

First Richard Burton film, like, ever. Haven’t seen his sometimes wife for the blog yet and I expected to get a two for one with Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, still on my DVR. Burton wanted Taylor to play his love interest but Claire Bloom was cast instead.

Slow, plodding, and dreary, the story is surprisingly engaging. Burton played a borderline drunk, which must have been quite a stretch for him, what with him being a roaring drunk. Filming would occasionally be interrupted by his and Taylor’s drunken behavior. The character’s age was changed from 50 to 39, Burton’s age at the time, but he looked every bit of 50, and more. He would die at fifty eight.

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold is a compelling if confounding story. Its tone is quite different from most movies of the day and the viewer is tossed in many directions. Also, Burton barely emoted at all. It will stand up to a second viewing. I still have one puzzle about the ending to solve. AMRU 4.

“Fiedler's a Jew, of course, and Mundt's quite the other thing.”

Christmas in July (1940)

Jimmy (Dick Powell), convinced he has good ideas, submits a slogan in a contest and waits for the results. The judges can’t reach a decision, so Jimmy’s co-workers send him a prank telegram. The coffee company, thinking the telegram is real, pay him the $25,000. Comedic mayhem ensues.

Jimmy doesn’t deposit the check, but instead shows people so that they let him have stuff on faith. This is reminiscent of the Mark Twain story “The Million Pound Bank Note”. Here, however, Jimmy has no reason to believe he isn’t the authentic winner. And let’s consider for a moment how insane a $25,000 prize is. Adjusted for inflation, it would be over a half million dollars. That’s one hell of a contest. Preston Sturges only got $6000 for the script.

The company holding the contest was Maxford House Coffee who used the slogan “Grand to the Last Gulp”. Sounds familiar. It was a less litigious time. Old friend William Demarest returns, again with a silly name.

Not a Christmas movie but it has a Christmas title. I thought it an ironic way to kick off the holiday season. I may continue the irony. Christmas in July is another witty comedy from Preston Sturges. He only directed thirteen features and this is my sixth. I should see the rest. AMRU 3.5.

Wings (1927)

Two men, one from a rich family, vie for the affection of a woman (not Clara Bow). When duty calls, they both sign up as pilots for the Great War.

Clara received top billing despite not being the lead. Having made a huge splash earlier in the year with It, the twenty two year old’s star power was at an all-time high. The studio capitalized on her fame, giving her a “topless” scene. She would go on to appear in nothing else of interest. She didn’t transition to talkies very well or to thirty at all. Clara married a cowboy star and retired to a comfortable life of mental illness. She would die at the ripe old age of sixty. And so it goes.

Gary Cooper appears in a very short scene, one of his earliest credited roles. It was enough to kick start his career into lead roles. The real leads are Buddy Rogers and Richard Arlen as Jack and David, whose relationship begins as rivals but evolves throughout the film. Arlen would actually marry the object of his affection in real life.

Some state of the art visual effects trickery was employed to show the leads flying the airplanes. What the filmmakers did was to strap a camera to the front of an old airplane and tell the actors to fly it. This technique worked surprisingly well.

Wings is a lavish, expansive, and expensive film. The 2016 restoration, which reunited it with the original score, is breathtaking. A two and a half hour silent film is a tough sell and I would be lying if I said it didn’t occasionally drag, but it is amazingly engaging. Hand painted frames highlighted the flames of crashing planes and the flash of the gunfire. It is quite the spectacle. AMRU 4.

Cleopatra (1934)

Beleaguered by Rome, Queen Cleopatra (Claudette Colbert) shores up power by seducing Cesar (Warren William). When his reign is cut short (spoiler alert!), she pivots to Marc Antony (Henry Wilcoxon). Things don’t go well for him either.

Director Cecil B. DeMille wanted to produce a version of Cleopatra for the common man, and by all accounts he succeeded. Loads of pre-code sex, corny and awkward dialog, Busby Berkeley-esque cinematography, it was quite the spectacle. Impressively one of three Colbert films nominated for Best Picture, but they did nominate twelve that year. She would strike pay dirt with It Happened One Night.

In preparation for the production, DeMille screened the 1917 version. Three and a half years later, that print was destroyed, making this the oldest surviving version of the story. To flaunt the Motion Picture Production Code, he included as much sex as he could get away with, including an opening featuring a slave girl who appears to be naked to those inclined to believe she is.

C. Aubrey Smith crafted a career playing the “elderly Englishman”. He managed to appear in 110 films, including some pretty good ones, despite being past fifty when his career began. Here he was an elderly General. Antony’s Wilcoxon would later achieve immortality as the Bishop in Caddyshack. Well, maybe immortality isn’t the right word.

Cleopatra is an interesting, if peculiar watch. The dialog is, by design, jarringly informal. The Oscar-winning cinematography is still impactful, but limited by the format of the day. Look for the impressive crane long take. AMRU 3.

“What? Have you heard of Cleopatra?
Of course. All kinds of things. Is she black?”

The Major and the Minor (1942)

Susan (Ginger Rogers), disillusioned with life in New York City, decides to move back home. Unfortunately, fares have increased and she can no longer afford her ticket. So naturally she dresses as a minor to get a half fare. The train ushers don’t buy it so she hides in the cabin of an Army Major (Ray Milland). He doesn’t doubt her for a second and they strike up a friendship.

Ginger Rogers has a youthful appearance and pulls off the child look to a degree, but it is a big ask of the audience to think that anyone taking a close look would actually believe she is a child. Major Kirby’s fiance sees Sue-Sue without pigtails and get’s the “wrong” idea, only to become convinced once the pigtails return.

Let’s get the big issue out of the way, which is the budding relationship between a 35 year old, engaged Army Major and someone he believes to be under twelve years old. That the viewer knows full well from the beginning that Susan is an adult helps keep the creep factor at bay, aided by the fact that Rogers is simply not believable as a preteen. Also, Billy Wilder’s comedic script keeps the tone light and deftly side-steps problematic notions.

Susan stays with the Major’s fiancee (Rita Johnson, two years younger than Ginger), bunking with her little sister (Diana Hill). Hill’s Lucy not only sees through the ruse but explains in detail why. They live at the cadet training institute that fiance's dad runs and Susan attracts the sometimes toxic attention of the none-the-wiser teenaged cadets.

Longtime screenwriter Wilder was given a chance to direct a Hollywood feature, and the result isn’t bad. It’s not one of his best, but certainly not a misfire. Not as funny or moving as his best work, and I didn’t care for the conclusion, but that’s setting a high bar. AMRU 3.