Deanna Durbin looks so smarted, grown up and sensible at sixteen that when she invites Robert Cummings to a family dinner in this movie, her sisters think she's keen on him and you're thinking "she could have a crack here" because she looks old enough.
But in actual fact she isn't - she's trying to set Cummings up with Helen Parrish who is in love with Nan Grey's fiancee (William Lundigan). That's not a bad set up for a film but the movie has, for me, a few flaws - more time (at least another scene) needed to be spent in the Cummings-Grey romance and on the Lundigan-Parrish romance. I get at the end Grey running off to be with Cummings, but Lundigan calmly accepting a new bride...? On his wedding day....? This isn't 19th century royal Europe.
It's all well acted, very sensitively directed by Henry Koster. Durbin is excellent. Cummings plays a bit of a bohemian than he normally would, a musician with slightly longer hair - but he's charming and very good; it's the second biggest part in the movie.
There's a more serious subplot about Durbin's workaholic father neglecting his kids - most of these early Durbin movies were about her and a father figure. The dad is so absent minded though at times it felt like he had Alzheimers.
No comments:
Post a Comment