Dangerous When Wet

Esther Williams has the misfortune to be born to a family of irrepressible morning people. You know the type: always perky and cheerful first thing in the morning and ready to beat it into you if you're not. Esther enters a contest to swim the English Channel, and for some reason the time of the race is set only the night before. Wouldn't you know it, that's the night she's chosen to go out drinking with Fernando Lamas.

All in all, a delightful piece of fluff. This is the one where Esther dances a water ballet with Tom and Jerry.

MGM always released an Esther Williams movie as a bit of relaxing summer entertainment with the Swimming Sweetheart obliging everyone by looking pretty in a bathing suit as she plunges into those big swimming pools.

Here she plunges into the English Channel to compete for top prize. She's from a family of health addicts headed by William Demarest and Charlotte Greenwood (who happen to look foolish during some of their song-and-dance routines) and encouraged by coach Jack Carson. Denise Darcel is her romantic rival--but wait, she has Fernando Lamas, a dashing Frenchman, ready to offer her romance aboard his yacht. It's all quite watchable, if silly, and definitely not one of Esther's finest moments.

A memorable highlight is her underwater fling with Tom & Jerry that is fun to watch and dazzling to contemplate. But the film itself is a light, airy entertainment that is strictly a no-brainer guaranteed to please the masses. And Esther, as usual, looks gorgeous in and out of a bathing suit. Real life hubby, Fernando Lamas, however, comes across as one of her less versatile leading men, no matter how handsome he is.

The musical interludes are few and far between. None of them are remarkable. What the film needed was a lift from a song like "Baby, It's Cold Outside" (as in 'Neptune's Daughter'), but instead there are a few dreary numbers such as "Ain't Nature Grand?" and "In My Wildest Dreams". The channel swimming scenes will have you rooting for Esther as you huff and puff with her! Could have been better, but what the heck.

Even in films with not-much-to-write-home-about stories (though a good deal of her films are still worth watching), Esther Williams was always watchable and more, with her swimming talent on film second to none. Tom and Jerry are two of my favourite animated characters, as a lifelong fan of animation, and a legendary animated-comic duo. Have always loved musicals too.

Williams is captivating in how fetching she is and she radiates in charm, her swimming talent hardly wasted. She has very clear chemistry with Fernando Lamas (though she has had partners with a little more charisma than he), and wonderfully supported by a peppy Barbara Whiting, an energetic Jack Carson and a perfectly cast William Demarest and Charlotte Greenwood.

'Dangerous When Wet's' highlight is the sequence with Williams and Tom and Jerry, which is simply ingenious in every sense. Very close behind are Whiting's "I Like Men" and the very determined and moving English Channel swim scene.

Furthermore, 'Dangerous When Wet' looks great, being beautifully photographed and designed and the colours are rich and colourful. The songs are not exceptional but they are very pleasant and put one in a good mood, but it's the way they're staged that elevate them to a better level.

The script is lively and perky enough, while Charles Walters directs competently. The story while meandering a little in pace towards the end makes for by far one of the more eventful, more plausible and more atmospherically warm and likable Esther Williams films.

Overall, great fun and charming, anybody who like Williams and Tom and Jerry shouldn't miss it. 8/10 Bethany Cox

Katie Higgins (Esther Williams) is the eldest daughter of a dairy-farming family of health nuts. Health tonic promoter Windy Weebe (Jack Carson) convinces her to enter a contest to swim the English Channel. After arriving in Europe, Katie finds herself pursued by a dashing Frenchman (Fernando Lamas). This is one of Esther's best movies. She's gorgeous here, as she always was -- the Queen of Technicolor. The cast is great. Highlights include Barbara Whiting's performance of the cheeky song "I Like Men," Esther's famous underwater ballet with Tom & Jerry, and pretty much every scene with William Demarest. It's a very funny and charming musical comedy. A must-see for Esther fans.

Jack Carson plays a traveling salesman, promoting a potion called Liqua-pep on the county fair circuit. While driving through Arkansas, he meets a family that owns a dairy farm and are dedicated to physical fitness.

When Jack's character, Wendy, realizes the eldest daughter, Katy (that's how it's spelled in the credits)--played by Esther Williams--is a beauty and a tireless swimmer, he wants her to attempt the English Channel as a promotion for his snake oil. Eventually, she agrees.

Along the way, she meets a Frenchman played by Fernando Lamas (who Esther marries sixteen years later) who becomes her love interest.

Esther's films tend to be light fare, intending merely to entertain while allowing her to swim in a pool, a lagoon, or wherever the script might take her. "Dangerous When Wet" includes a few upbeat songs and the usual all-American touchstones. But it is best known for Esther's underwater swimming sequence with Tom and Jerry (Jerry danced nine years earlier with Gene Kelly).