Bringing Up Baby (B or 3/4 stars)
'Bringing Up Baby' is a quintessential 1930s screwball comedy directed by Howard Hawks. It's chock full of manic energy, fun banter, sexual innuendos & farce. I typically don't love this genre - I felt like Scrooge for deciding that the much-heralded His Girl Friday was not my cup of tea - but I took a real liking to this one. Dr. David Huxley (Cary Grant) is a nerdy paleontologist who is engaged to his stuffy asst., Alice (Virginia Walker). After working for 4 yrs. to locate a rare dinosaur bone to complete the reconstruction of a brontosaurus skeleton, he finds it(!), & now looks forward to his marriage. The museum David works at sends him to the golf course to meet corporation lawyer, who represents wealthy socialite Elizabeth Random (May Robson).
The socialite is being asked to donate a $1,000,000 grant for his museum to finish an exhibit on dinosaurs. While golfing, David runs into socialite Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn), Elizabeth's feisty niece, who takes a shine to David, and does all she can to mess up his golf game ... and his upcoming marriage. Hijinks ensue involving David having to wear women's clothes. Before long, Susan is asking David to help transport her pet leopard named 'Baby' to her aunt's Connecticut estate. Mishaps ensue involving a poultry truck accident, David serenading Baby in a tree, & Aunt Elizabeth's terrier named George (Asta, from The Thin Man movies) losing a bone ... the very dinosaur bone that David finally found after 4 years. Frantic David goads George into digging up the bone, but with no success. Meanwhile, the gardener with a thick Irish brogue (Barry Fitzgerald) inadvertently lets Baby loose and, when he sees the leopard, wonders if he's going nuts or if he drank too much.
David's misadventures continue as a different {and wild} leopard escapes from a circus vehicle & gets confused with Baby! A constable arrests David & Susan after thinking they are nutters talking about leopards. In time, an angered Alice arrives {David missed their wedding date} & finds that Susan has escaped jail to retrieve the leopard while Aunt Elizabeth got arrested for causing a stink. What ensues next? Susan attempting a leopard swap at the nearby circus; to get her tamed pet back. Back at the museum, Alice cancels the wedding, while Susan brings back the bone + an offer of Auntie's $1,000,000 donation to the museum. In true rom-com fashion, David tells Susan that he loves her, and an assumed Happily Ever After should follow.
This film is just a hoot. Some may find the pace to be too frenetic & the rapid-fire dialogue to be a bit too much. But I shockingly found it refreshing & humorous; again, madcap comedies are NOT my thing {His Girl Friday, My Man Godfrey}. I also snickered at all the sexual innuendo going on that the Hays Code somehow missed; or allowed. The opening scene sets that tone straight away: David - a fairly sexual being - holds a large dino bone & says to frigid Alice, "I think this belongs in the tail", to which she replies, "You tried the tail yesterday ... and it didn't fit" {haha}. From beginning to end, the proceedings are packed with funny situations & hilarious lines such as the ones I provided above. And how can you not love the leopard(s)?
I very much enjoyed Cary Grant as the rational, yet bumbling, emasculated {by his fiancee} man thrown into the chaotic life of a loony socialite. But because he lets himself fall for Susan - his opposite in every way - it liberates the uptight professor. His romantic tension & repartee with Hepburn is aces, as well. And the supporting cast including Charles Ruggles {hilarious}, May Robson {playing bewildered so well} & Fritz Field is great. Again, 'Bringing Up Baby' represents, for me, the apex of screwball 1930s comedies. Some love it, some don't. For me, aside from the performances, stylishness & editing {those leopard sequences}, I also found it witty, clever, yet also sophisticated in its good-humor & poking fun at science, law & the upper-class.
The socialite is being asked to donate a $1,000,000 grant for his museum to finish an exhibit on dinosaurs. While golfing, David runs into socialite Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn), Elizabeth's feisty niece, who takes a shine to David, and does all she can to mess up his golf game ... and his upcoming marriage. Hijinks ensue involving David having to wear women's clothes. Before long, Susan is asking David to help transport her pet leopard named 'Baby' to her aunt's Connecticut estate. Mishaps ensue involving a poultry truck accident, David serenading Baby in a tree, & Aunt Elizabeth's terrier named George (Asta, from The Thin Man movies) losing a bone ... the very dinosaur bone that David finally found after 4 years. Frantic David goads George into digging up the bone, but with no success. Meanwhile, the gardener with a thick Irish brogue (Barry Fitzgerald) inadvertently lets Baby loose and, when he sees the leopard, wonders if he's going nuts or if he drank too much.
David's misadventures continue as a different {and wild} leopard escapes from a circus vehicle & gets confused with Baby! A constable arrests David & Susan after thinking they are nutters talking about leopards. In time, an angered Alice arrives {David missed their wedding date} & finds that Susan has escaped jail to retrieve the leopard while Aunt Elizabeth got arrested for causing a stink. What ensues next? Susan attempting a leopard swap at the nearby circus; to get her tamed pet back. Back at the museum, Alice cancels the wedding, while Susan brings back the bone + an offer of Auntie's $1,000,000 donation to the museum. In true rom-com fashion, David tells Susan that he loves her, and an assumed Happily Ever After should follow.
This film is just a hoot. Some may find the pace to be too frenetic & the rapid-fire dialogue to be a bit too much. But I shockingly found it refreshing & humorous; again, madcap comedies are NOT my thing {His Girl Friday, My Man Godfrey}. I also snickered at all the sexual innuendo going on that the Hays Code somehow missed; or allowed. The opening scene sets that tone straight away: David - a fairly sexual being - holds a large dino bone & says to frigid Alice, "I think this belongs in the tail", to which she replies, "You tried the tail yesterday ... and it didn't fit" {haha}. From beginning to end, the proceedings are packed with funny situations & hilarious lines such as the ones I provided above. And how can you not love the leopard(s)?
I very much enjoyed Cary Grant as the rational, yet bumbling, emasculated {by his fiancee} man thrown into the chaotic life of a loony socialite. But because he lets himself fall for Susan - his opposite in every way - it liberates the uptight professor. His romantic tension & repartee with Hepburn is aces, as well. And the supporting cast including Charles Ruggles {hilarious}, May Robson {playing bewildered so well} & Fritz Field is great. Again, 'Bringing Up Baby' represents, for me, the apex of screwball 1930s comedies. Some love it, some don't. For me, aside from the performances, stylishness & editing {those leopard sequences}, I also found it witty, clever, yet also sophisticated in its good-humor & poking fun at science, law & the upper-class.