The Toy Tiger

First seen as a Deanna Durbin film with her singing a few high notes as an extra special treat, The Toy Tiger is a remake of Durbin's Mad About Music with young Tim Hovey putting over a bit of a con game among his classmates at the boarding school where his career driven mother has placed him. Laraine Day as the mom runs an advertising agency where Jeff Chandler is her art director. She sends him on assignment to a rural area to find Judson Pratt a successful commercial artist who chucked it all for art's sake.

Two things happen while Chandler is on the trip. First it's Pratt who persuades him to get away from it all and paint for his own sake. Secondly Jeff kind of steps into the role that Tim Hovey has created for his image of a father. Wouldn't you know it, Hovey's boarding school is located right where Pratt is.

I can't see the film being made a third time. It's badly dated and this one didn't even have some Durbin songs in it.

According to Marilyn Kirk's biography of Jeff Chandler, he and his leading lady Laraine Day knew each other through her then husband Leo Durocher who was until the year before The Toy Tiger came out, the manager of the New York Giants and Chandler was quite the fan. Amazing as he was from Brooklyn. He spent many happy hours working out with Leo's Giants who in 1954 were the World Series winner.

If not ranked as one of Chandler's best films I'm sure The Toy Tiger was an enjoyable experience to make. It was a change from the action/ adventure stuff he was normally doing.

Young Timothy Hovey is very cute and charming, and quite an actor for his young age. His diction is very good for a child, which makes it easy to understand the numerous comments he makes under his breath. Several particularly funny moments in this film include the dock scene when Gwen goes to "Wash up", the "Arrest" scene, and of course Chandler's very deadpan story about the elephant. If you have not seen the other film which "features" Tim Hovey, I recommend you see The Private War of Major Benson, starring Charlton Heston, Tim Considine, and Sal Mineo. It is also very funny and was still available on VHS in 2005 (MCA). I am glad to see that these films are getting some attention, they are certainly rare in the film industry as being entirely inoffensive, family fare.

Hollywood made a number of movies about one-parent children who had lost a mother or father. Whether drama or comedy, such films always tugged at the audiences' hearts. "The Toy Tiger" is one such film, with a very cute child, Tim Hovey, playing Timmie Harkinson. Laraine Day plays his mother, who goes by the name of Gwen Taylor, and Jeff Chandler, as Rick Todd, becomes the unwitting dad to fill the shoes of the make-believe father Timmie has created to impress his mates at the private school his mom has enrolled him in.

Timmie says to Rick that he wasn't telling a lie because when he crosses his fingers it's just making believe, or a fairy tale. Rick lets that go and no one ever corrects Timmie on that point. But it turns out well after some funny scenes get Rick hooked into assuming the role of Timmie's mysterious explorer father. It is a bit hard to take Gwen's sudden warming up to and romantic attraction to Rick at the end. She had been a tough, hard as nails ad agency manager, and even Rick doubted her first efforts at letting her hair down. She had been too serious and all business and cut-throat before that.

But, this is Hollywood and a film meant to entertain and it does that, built around a young boy with a terrific imagination. Hovey was quite small for his age. He's supposed to be and looks and acts the part of a seven-year-old boy in this picture. But he was actually 11 years old when the movie came out. He didn't stay in movies beyond 1959, but worked in the music field. He died of a drug overdose at age 44 in 1989.

The plot to "The Toy Tiger" makes little sense and is, if you think about it, pretty creepy. Despite this, however, I recommend this film as it's very sweet. My recommendation is don't think too much about the plot...just enjoy it for hat it is.

Timmie Harkinson (Tim Hovey) is a very sad kid. He's lived most of his life at a boys school and seldom sees his mother, as she's a big-time executive with little time for him. As for his father, the man died before Timmie was born. However, Timmie has a VERY active imagination and instead of admitting to the other kids at school that he hasn't a father, he has created an imaginary one...and even going to the trouble of buying foreign postage stamps and writing fake letters from this mythical dad. As for the father, Timmie's told everyone that the reason the man never visits is because he's an explorer who travels the world capturing exotic animals for zoos.

After some time, the kids at the school have become suspicious and the boy is in a panic. He doesn't want to admit that his father is fictional....and he even goes to the trouble of heading into town to meet this dad as his train supposedly arrives! But then something odd happens....Timmie is able to convince a nice guy, Rick (Jeff Chandler) to pose as his dad! What's next? Well, see the film as I don't want to tell you too much.

The film is fun...period. Is it brilliant? No. In fact, it's a remake of an earlier Deanna Durbin movie. But I really enjoyed watching it...something you cannot say about many other films.

There are few movies as sweet and likeable as this one. Most movies strain to impress, forgetting, that relaxed unpretentiousness is a good thing. Movies should be good, not great or grand. Few movies exhibit let alone exemplify family values. This is a rare exception.