It Happened in Flatbush

Enjoyable movie. Years back they would have called this a B film. Today, it would rate A+.

Lloyd Nolan provides just the right touch as the baseball manager. His speech intonation reflects a wonderful Brooklyn accent. We bums in Brooklyn would appreciate every minute of it.

Brought back to manage a baseball team by the owner, (Sara Allgood in an all too brief performance) the film depicts the trials and tribulations of managing a last place team to pennant contention.

Romance is in the air as Nolan tries to woo the snooty niece of the recently deceased owner. Carol Landis does well as the niece.

We see Brooklyn at its best here as the faithful root for the Bums of yesteryear.

Wonderful nostalgia.

Those of us who grew up with, and loved, the Brooklyn Dodgers had gotten a smile and a kick out of this film. Does anyone know if it is available anywhere? Would love to turn back the clock and enjoy this one over again. Great film - hell no! But so much of the Brooklyn spirit....and great dialogue poking fun at non-Brooklynites.Lloyd Nolan, of course, was fine in his role as manager of the team, and the much maligned but beautiful and actually quite talented Carole Landis is a wonderful woman to have around. Then there is the wonderful Sara Allgood...... No, Ray McCarey didn't have the chance to reach the career status of his brother, Leo, but Ray's films are devoid of the sentimental mash that his brother offered. Has anyone actually been able to watch Going My Way anymore? Impossible (even with the joy of seeing Rise Stevens).

There is nothing groundbreaking about this story of washed-up ballplayer Lloyd Nolan taking charge of the Brooklyn Dodgers only to fall in love with the beautiful heiress who co-owns the team, Carole Landis. The inevitability of a happy ending is never in doubt, but this is a pleasant way to spend 90 minutes of free time nonetheless. Use of game footage from actual Dodger games in 1941 adds immediacy and authenticity, and makes the film worth a look for the sake of posterity.

Very enjoyable "B" movie from 1942. Nolan as skipper of Brooklyn Dodgers is good. For once they did not use old Wrigley Field in Los Angeles for the long shot scenes. Instead they used films of the three games played at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn in the 1941 World Series. You can tell from the bunting hanging from the stands. Also some events are very close to actual happenings of the old Dodgers. A most for all us old Brooklyn Dodger fans.

Nolan is perfectly cast as the struggling ball club manager. What a fine effortless actor he was, always making dialog sound both natural and spontaneous. The movie had more substance than I expected. It's not a straight Cinderella story of a manager taking a last place team (Brooklyn) to the top. Instead, Maguire (Nolan) has plenty of downs to go with the occasional up, and in the romantic department, as well. And what a dish Carole Landis (Kathryn) is, all outfitted here in upper-class finery, and before she became the more familiar blonde.

The most notable thing about this sports story is how the fans of Brooklyn are portrayed. Note that the movie was made at the beginning of WWII. The preceding decade of the 1930's was the decade of the "common man" when everyday ordinariness was honored by Hollywood's dream factory.

Here, that ordinariness is on display with an emphasis on fighting spirit from both the rowdy fans and the Brooklyn team. On a larger scale, it would take that sort of popular effort and team spirit to win the big war, which amounts to a topical sub-text even in this modest programmer.

Note too how the upper class is portrayed as slightly effete, especially lounge lizard Walter (Allen), Maguire's rival for Kathryn's affections. In the screenplay, Brooklyn stands for the borough of the common man and his combative spirit, while Manhattan receives a rather dismissive upper-class reference. It's Hollywood gearing up for the big war, and, on the whole, a better movie than I expected, but nothing special.

(In passing—I can't help noticing that the Brooklyn team is never referred to as the Dodgers, just as the generic "Brooklyn". Similarly, for St. Louis minus the Cardinals. I expect these generic references allowed the producers to avoid legal problems.)