Walking My Baby Back Home

'Walking My Baby Back Home' is a pleasant low-budget musical, featuring a score largely cobbled together from other sources. The opening credits feature a choral rendition of the (familiar) title song, over a shot of a young couple's feet: the boy is walking the girl back home. This reminded me of a much better movie musical: 'The Barkleys of Broadway' opened with a shot of a man's and a woman's dancing feet ... then the camera quickly moved upwards to reveal that these dancers were Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, reunited on screen after 10 years apart. During the opening credits of 'Walking My Baby', I expected the camera to move upwards to reveal that these dancing feet belonged to Donald O'Connor and Janet Leigh, the personable young leads in this movie. When no such thing happened, I was forced to conclude that these people in the opening shot were dance doubles, filling in for the leads ... which gives us a taste of things to come.

This movie is pleasant but nothing much. (Except for the bizarre 'Top of the Town', Universal Studios' musicals were never impressive, and always low-budget.) O'Connor plays an eager young guy just out of the army with his buddies, and determined to succeed in showbiz as a bandleader. Janet Leigh plays his supportive girlfriend: attractive, a lithe and sexy dancer, but given little to work with here. She has one good number, in which she sings a new lyric written to the old Stephen Foster tune 'Camptown Ladies', but with two extra beats written into the jazzed-up melody line. I found this song annoying for two reasons: Universal's front office was obviously using a public-domain tune to save money ... and, having made this decision, they then tinkered with a beloved popular tune by bunging a few extra notes into it in the hope of making it more 'jazzy' for a 1950s audience.

The gross and vulgar Buddy Hackett plays O'Connor's army buddy, although Hackett is much too fat to be plausible as a guy who just got out of the service. Shortly before this movie was made, Hackett had attracted a lot of attention with a nightclub routine in which he impersonated a Chinese waiter. That routine is excruciatingly enacted here, in an early scene when O'Connor and his army buddies decide to get some lunch in a Chinese takeaway, but find the place deserted. 'We need a Chinese waiter,' says Hackett. 'Why don't YOU be a Chinese waiter?' O'Connor replies. This is Hackett's cue to tie a string across his eyelids (ostensibly making him look 'Chinese') while he babbles pidgin English in a singsong voice. I found this routine offensive and laboured, and it doesn't build to a punchline. Buddy Hackett's shtick here is the most offensive impersonation of an Oriental I've ever seen BUT ONE ... the all-time worst is Robert Ryan's ying-tong routine in 'Clash by Night'.

I'll rate 'Walking My Baby' 4 out of 10, mostly for Janet Leigh's gorgeous looks and lithe moves. Trivia note: more than 20 years after this movie was made, Janet Leigh (still with a great figure!) guest-starred in an episode of 'Columbo' as an old-time movie star who commits a murder. A couple of sequences from 'Walking My Baby Back Home' were inserted into the 'Columbo' episode to represent film clips from the career of the fictional movie star Leigh was playing. That 'Columbo' episode is a lot more entertaining than this weak movie. It's astonishing to realise that 'Walking My Baby Back Home' was directed (very limply) by Lloyd Bacon, who previously directed one of the greatest movie musicals of all time: '42nd Street'.

Can someone please help me find a copy of this movie. I have an 8x10 glossy of Donald O'Conner singing in front of the band in the movie. My father was one of the band members and would love to find a copy of the movie as a remembrance and to add to my collection of movies he was in. Would love any help I can get. All in all, the movie was great I thought. You need to remember when the movie was made and most musicals of the day were a little plot challenged, but the music and clothes were what were the most fun and the sheer entertainment value of the times. The '50's were a lighthearted, fun era and the movies of the time reiterated that.

This mediocre film has a good cast, and loving Janet Leigh's early films this is one I have looked for for years. It looks as if it was made in the early 1940's and not 1953, and Donald O'Connor, not in a top drawer film still shows how fine he was both as an actor and a dancer. But watch the film for co-starring Lori Nelson who was not Tab Hunter's ex as this site says. The women in his life were covers for his homosexuality which of course was well hidden then by obliging actors such as Lori Nelson. He has written all this down and can be checked. Sadly Lori Nelson died this year and she brightened up any film she was in, even with films like ' Revenge of the Creature ', and at her best with Jane Russell and Richard Egan in ' Underwater ! '. I hope she will be remembered even for light hearted run of the mill musicals like this. The story is thin and no spoilers, but it passes a pleasant hour and almost a half. I like it for what it is and Janet Leigh is Janet Leigh. What higher compliment can I give her in praise of her shining bright beauty and a keen intelligent eye for right timing. Again I repeat sadly this is a review for Lori Nelson and her passing last Summer.

Universal International's "Walking My Baby Back Home" may suffer when compared with the elaborate production values of the great MGM musicals but it is, nonetheless, a very likable piece of entertainment. It does not take itself too seriously and does not try to be anything more than what it is: a fun little movie. Its charm derives mainly from the sunny personalities of its two talented leads.

Donald O'Connor was one of the most versatile young performers in Hollywood during the early '50s. He could sing (passably enough for a musical), he could dance (no qualifiers needed here), he could do comedy (Who else could make pictures with a talking mule without looking ridiculous?) and he could do drama as he proved later in his career. Why he wasn't a bigger star is a mystery. Perhaps it was because he was too good-natured and looked to boyish to be taken seriously. But his role here, as the enthusiastic young bandleader who is looking for that "right" sound and eventually stumbles onto Dixieland-Jazz, suits his persona to a tee.

He is helped in no small part by the very pretty, and equally enthusiastic, Janet Leigh. Leigh, who must surely have had one of the most disarming smiles in cinema history, had begun her career with MGM and, although she had been taught to sing and dance at the studio, she could not make a dent in Arthur Freed's high-powered talent pool. "Walking My Baby Back Home" gave her the rare opportunity to star in a musical and she acquits herself nicely (she would make a bigger impression two years later in Columbia's "My Sister Eileen"). Her "Camptown Races" number, in which she is dressed only in top hat, bow tie, one piece swimsuit, white gloves, and high heels is a treat for the eyes, especially for Janet Leigh fans.

The comedy, provided mostly by O'Connor and Buddy Hackett, is breezy and only adds to the fun. O'Connor's second opera-singing lesson with Madame Grinaldo is a little forced but right in keeping with the lighthearted nature of the film. And the laryngitis scenes, in which O'Connor's facial expressions run the gamut from euphoria to despair, are hilarious. As for Hackett, he is fine as O'Connor's ex-army pal and wannabe musician. I do not find his Chinese waiter routine offensive, merely too long (He is definitely not helped by the man who plays the drunk!).

Again, the musical routines are not in MGM's league, but they are pleasant enough. The film's highlight is the dance number in which O'Connor and Leigh gambol, to the title tune, through a toy-like playground which is set against a backdrop that looks like a child's drawing. It is a nostalgic reminder of the sweetness and innocence of young love.

I once had the delightful experience of meeting Janet Leigh. In the course of our conversation, I mentioned that "Walking My Baby Back Home" was one of my favorite musicals, to which she enthused: "Oh, I loved that movie!"

You couldn't ask for a better endorsement than that.

November of 1985 was the first occasion on which I had the pleasure of seeing "Columbo: Forgotten Lady," the episode during which scenes from "Walking My Baby Back Home" are very prominently shown and add to the charm of the story. As unbelievable as this may sound, I very recently had to opportunity to see the movie "Walking My Baby Back Home" in its entirety--after more than 20 years of curiosity. The movie did not disappoint.

Janet Leigh and Donald O'Connor steal the show, with Buddy Hackett an excellent supporting sidekick. Although I must admit that the movie would mean very little to me if I were not such a "Columbo" fan, it is undeniable that "Walking My Baby Back Home" is a treat. I have watched it at least five times already since recently acquiring a copy from an e-bay seller and find it to be very entertaining and relaxing.

The movie has excellent musical numbers. The only negative is that the plot seems to be nothing much more than an excuse to lead into singing and dancing, which is fine with me. I wish they would make a lot more movies with the same quality, consideration, and dedication as obviously put forth in "Walking My Baby Back Home."