Quel numéro ce faux numéro!

Wholesome sitcom style family comedy not as bad as critics deemed. This G-rated comedy is very Brady Bunch style with the sum better than the parts. If your family is a fan of Nick at Nite then this movie should delight them. Directed by legendary Hollywood director turned TV-director, George Marshal, this film offers wacky slapstick, a wacky car chase, wacky boyscouts and wacky Phylis Diller on a motorcycle. Bob Hope play's a happily married (to "Make Room For Daddy"'s Marjorie Lord) real estate agent with two kids and a maid (Phylis Diller). One day he gets a wrong number from a Hollywood movie star (a dazzling and very funny Elke Sommer) in hiding from her studio. Eventually Hope tries to help the starlet in her quest for privacy. Trying to keep the news out of the paper, and his association with her from his wife, the film is basically one situation after another of trying to hide Sommer from someone. Hope is a bit subdued with terrible lines but, as usual, has good chemistry with Diller and plays the part of the responsible loving husband but victim of circumstances very well. The part of the movie starlet could easily have been a dumb-blonde role, but Elke Sommer (who was great in the comedy "A Shot in the Dark") brings the role life with a very clever performance and a great flair for physical comedy. She gets a bit upstaged by Hope and Diller, but does just fine alongside the two pros. Just a nice, clean, fun show for all ages.

This movie is a campfest. Elke Sommer plays a temperamental star who ends up on the run from her studio. She inadvertently gets hooked up with married man Bobe Hope who tries to conceal her from the police and his wife Marjorie Lord. Phyllis Diller steals the show as Bobe Hope's maid. Very subtle risqué humor permeates this movie. If you listen very carefully you can hear some very suggestive dialogue between Bobe Hope and Phyllis. While Phyllis is eavesdropping on Bobe & Elke's phone call she is shown peeling a banana. When she hears a vaguely sexual remark she squeezes the bottom and the banana pops out of it's skin and onto the floor! Very subtle but VERY suggestive which is what I loved about the 60's, nothing is as blatant as today. Light fluff of a movie but lots of fun. I guess some previous viewers are so bombarded with in your face grossness these days in most movies they didn't see or appreciate the innocence of this flick.

Basically, this is a half-hour sitcom stretched out to feature length. The main players are fine, and are comfortable in their parts. But the gags are tired and obvious. For instance, in an overlong chase scene, Phyllis Diller (on motorcycle) not only does the old "knock the fire hydrant, causing geyser" gag, but also the "rides through a ditch as several workers jump out in panic" gag. There's satire on current movies (James Bond, girls in bubble baths) and a couple of laughs (mostly from Bob), but it's primarily a tepid French farce, with Hope trying to hide a sexy movie queen from his wife.

Fans of Bob Hope (like myself) might be willing to put up with it, but if you're new to his films, please do yourself a favor and start with the 1940s road pictures with Bing Crosby.

I just watched this film after taping it among several others from TCM's recent Bob Hope movie marathon. I saw it originally in a downtown theater here as a kid with my parents and sisters in the summer of 1966. I didn't see it again until about 20 years later, upon renting a copy of it from a local video store. My viewing of it the other night made it almost another 20 years since I'd last seen it. I'm a huge Bob Hope fan, so in my eyes he can do no wrong. Although it has its critics, one must realize the context of the times in which "Number" was made. Sex farces were all the rage in the 60's, especially smack-dab in the middle of the decade, when this film was released. Bob appeared regularly throughout each TV season on his NBC specials, and they always got huge ratings, especially his annual Christmas shows from Vietnam. The release of a new Bob Hope movie was a cause for celebration, especially in the long, hot summers of those days. Yes, "Number" essentially is an elongated TV sketch, but it presented a mildly risqué plot in which Bob had to deal with a world-famous sex kitten who suddenly disrupts his life as a married-with-2-children, middle-class realtor, who's experiencing a sales slump. He decides to use runaway movie star Didi as a promotional point for selling an undesirable lakefront cabin he can't sell. His plan backfires, though, but not before he fends off each crisis with his usual breezy one-liners and humorous repartee. Bob's character certainly appreciates Didi's seductive charms, but he's not lecherous. Although he has to control himself at times, the male viewer can really sympathize and identify with his plight. Just when we think he's going to give in and become unfaithful to his marriage vows, his comical responses pull him back from the brink, the viewers laughing at his self-imposed reprieves. I think female viewers enjoy watching these kinds of situations, too. In short, I still like the film. Bob had both discovered and made Phyllis Diller's career, frequently having her on his TV specials in those years. To today's audiences, she may be unrecognizable or of no special consequence in this movie, but to audiences of 1966, she was a household name, her pairing with Bob in "Number" being a big draw. I think the movie was meant primarily as a breezy summer sex comedy, not to be taken seriously. Many of the lines are quite funny, although a few are obvious and uninspired. Still, though, it remains amusing throughout, but it's more in the vein of Bob's TV presence--a huge star who just wanted to stay in touch with the modern film audiences of the mid-1960's, and be seen in the type of sex farce that Americans of that generation enjoyed. One must also realize that Bob had been promoting Elke Sommer on his TV specials at this time, too, so this movie had a lot of built-in publicity and interest surrounding it. True, it's a forgettable film, and hardly one of Bob's classics, but it showcases him as a modern suburban husband and father, and a very witty and likable one at that, thus keeping him in step with how most Americans viewed themselves at the time, or would like to. P.S.: One of my favorite lines in the movie comes during the car chase near the end, where Bob's escaping in a police car while being followed by about 4 other police cars. He looks in his rearview mirror and says, "I've got more fuzz on my tail than a French poodle!" Great stuff!

I write this review after having finished a private double feature of Bob Hope films. Being a big fan of Hope, I really wanted to like "Boy Did I Get A Wrong Number!" His 1960s films are generally considered by most cinephiles to be his weakest but I enjoyed "Bachelor in Paradise"(1961), "The Road to Hong Kong"(1962), "Critic's Choice"and "Call Me Bwana"(both 1963), none of which are regarded as among Hope's better works. Perhaps it's the fact that I watched it just after watching a vastly superior, funnier and well-written Bob Hope comedy called "Caught in the Draft"(1941), but I have to say this would-be attempt at bedroom farce/Hollywood celebrity spoof falls completely flat. What went wrong? Hope and his 2 main female co-stars(Elke Sommer and Phyllis Diller) have great comic ability, and George Marshall had previously directed top-notch Hope laughfests "Fancy Pants"(1950) and "Monsieur Beaucaire"(1950), but no amount of talent in the actors or director can make up for a leaden script which plays like a 98 minute extended rerun of "Three's Company." The comic timing which is so necessary for a film of this type to work is completely off. The funniest thing in the picture is Marjorie Lord's humongous hairdo and I don't think that was the intent of either her or the filmmakers. Even Hope's immediate predecessor film, the so-so "I'll Take Sweden"(1965) was more entertaining.

Hope fans should skip this one and watch a "Road" film or any of the above mentioned Hope films instead while Elke Sommer fans should watch "A Shot in the Dark"(1964) or "The Prize"(1963) in lieu of "Wrong Number!".

Bottom line: 3 of 10 with 1 point for each of the 3 leads only.