Saturday, February 09, 2008

Movie review - "The Glass Bottom Boat" (1966) ***

A cheerful comedy where scientist Rod Taylor literally fishes Doris Day out of the water - they banter for a bit and fall in love, but things are complicated when Rod (who works for a government organisation) thinks that Doris is a spy. Frank Tashlin directs energetically, sending up the spy genre still had freshness in 1966, and every actor on the film gets into the spirit. Rod Taylor and Doris Day work well together - she's quite sexy here, wearing a mata hari outfit, and there's even a scene where she flat out tries to seduce Rod (he thinks she's a spy by then so doesn't go through with it but she's up for it, not question).

The title song is catchy, and there are some excellent performances from the support cast, including a young Dom de Luise. Amazingly, it would be the last time Rod made an out-and-out comedy for almost twenty years – a ridiculous waste considering the skill he had for the genre.

No comments: