It's a Great Feeling

This was really a picture to promote new talent Doris Day at the time by her studio, Warner Bros. Dennis Morgan & Jack Carson play themselves, trying to get Day (who plays a studio waitress) into the movies. The story and songs (except Cafe Rendezvous) are totally forgettable. The fun part are cameos from nearly every Warners actor at the time including Ronald Reagan, Jane Wyman, Danny Kaye, Gary Cooper, Sydney Greenstreet, Patricia Neal, Joan Crawford, Eleanor Parker, Edward G. Robinson, Errol Flynn and even directors David Butler (who directed this), Raoul Walsh (High Sierra, White Heat), Michael Curtiz (Yankee Doodle Dandy, Casablanca) & King Vidor (Beyond the Forest, The Fountainhead). Tailored for Day fans or classic film buffs. 2 1/2 stars out of 4.

For anybody who loves Golden Age Hollywood, Doris Day (very early on in her film career) and musicals, all of those apply to me, are very likely to find a lot to enjoy about 'It's a Great Feeling'. 'It's a Great Feeling' is not quite "great", but it is "good".

Admittedly the story is best forgotten. It is paper thin and cobbled together, with a shopworn concept (even in 1949) and parts being on the improbable side. The songs are very pleasant and beautifully performed by mainly Doris Day and Dennis Morgan, but, aside from the title song and the lovely duet "Blame My Absent-Minded Heart", they're of the inoffensive but not particularly memorable kind. Some of the pacing could perhaps have been tightened in places.

However, 'It's a Great Feeling' looks beautiful in colour and evokes a real sense of nostalgia in how it's all produced. As said, the songs are performed beautifully, while David Butler's direction is some of his more competent and engaged.

'It's a Great Feeling' excels in the script, which is funny and witty as well as fairly gentle in places. It particularly shines in the scenes between Doris Day and Bill Goodwin, which certainly showed that even early on in her film career Day had a gift for comedy.

While Dennis Morgan and Jack Carson are amusing and likable enough as themselves, it's Day in every way who shines the most, so graceful and charming as well as being a natural comedienne and an amazing singer. Along with Day, the biggest joy is the cameos. Most are very short and there are perhaps a little too many but they certainly hit more than they miss, don't think any of them missed actually, though it does help to have knowledge of who the cameos are.

Some great scenes, especially "Blame My Absent-Minded Heart", Irving Bacon, the Maurice Chevalier impression and a corker of a twist ending that nobody expects in a million years. The best of the cameos are Gary Cooper, Edward G. Robinson and particularly the pricelessly crazy one from Joan Crawford.

Overall, good fun. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Doris Day was already a singing sensation by the time she made her first film alongside her at-the-time sweetie-pie Jack Carson. She shared the screen with Jack in her second and third films, and their chemistry was so fantastic, those early films are always a pleasure to watch. In her third film, It's a Great Feeling, Doris plays a waitress with dreams of stardom. She has a character name, but virtually everyone else in the film plays themselves, which is pretty cute. Jack Carson and Dennis Morgan-playing themselves-have ulterior motives when they offer to help Doris start her acting career, and along the way, we're treated to cameos by Gary Cooper, Joan Crawford, Michael Curtiz, Danny Kaye, Eleanor Parker, Patricia Neal, Ronald Reagan, Edward G. Robinson, King Vidor, Raoul Walsh, Jane Wyman, and Errol Flynn.

Chalk full of well-known songs like "Blame My Absent-Minded Heart" and "That Was a Big Fat Lie", you'll be entertained from start to finish. It shows a funny, delightful side to the golden age of Hollywood, and it's adorable to see big stars making fun of themselves. For example, Joan Crawford, fresh from her Oscar for Mildred Pierce, slaps Jack Carson across the face, mimicking her famous slap from her earlier film. Rent this one when you're in the mood for something light and fun, and I guarantee Doris and Jack will give you a great feeling.

So much is made of how Jack Carson and Dennis Morgan were supposed to be Warner Bros. answer to Hope and Crosby that people miss the point that they actually made a rather enjoyable team in their own right. In fact, just keep your eyes on Jack Carson and you'll end up wondering if he stole from Hope or if Hope stole from Carson! Yeah, they weren't as big as their contemporaries, but so what? I really like them together. They teamed in several 1940s comedies at Warners and "It's a Great Feeling" is probably their best film and definitely my personal favorite. Not only are Carson and Morgan in top form here, but there's several cameos of WB stars that really make this a lot of fun. It's nicely directed by David Butler who interestingly enough directed Hope & Crosby in "The Road Morocco" seven years earlier. Butler also has a small cameo along with a few other Warner's directors which is just a nice little addition to the fabric of the film while a young and beautiful Doris Day makes for a great icing on the cake! So when all's said and done this is a really enjoyable little comedy. And at 85 minutes it certainly doesn't overstay its welcome. IMHO, "It's a Great Feeling" is a must for any fan of forties comedy fare. Just because Carson & Morgan won't make you forget Hope & Crosby doesn't mean they can't be memorable. I've always been a big fan of the so called "light musical comedies" of the 40s and this is one of the best. Highly recommended!

How revealing when Joan Crawford goes into her "drama queen" act and then admits she does that in all her movies. Or when Edward G. Robinson does his tough guy routine after persuading the studio guard to please let him act tough or they'll all be out of work. Good for a laugh. But it's also a little unsettling to see these super-stars as just ordinary folks, after all.

I gather (from TMC) the production was rushed through to meet certain obligations. If so, they did a cracker-jack job. Sure, the plot is about as shopworn as they come—provincial girl (Day) breaking into show business, helped (or hindered) by two fast-talking smoothies (Morgan & Carson). But it's done up with great bounce and energy. The youthful Day sparkles with the kind of winning luster that made her a movie star perennial. Carson mugs it up in amusing Carson fashion, while his buddy Morgan sings and looks handsome.

Then, of course, there are the star cameos from the Warners 1940's stable, including a "yup- ified" Gary Cooper sipping a malted through a straw, of all things. (Note how the famously boozy Hollywood suddenly prefers malts and ice cream to scotch and water—perhaps the movie's most amusing fiction.) Personally, though, I like Bill Goodwin's discombobulated producer best. His shtick with Day is a good running gag and I kept hoping he wouldn't get his glasses fixed.

Anyway, the movie's full of amusing bits cleverly woven together, including a behind-the- scenes look at the studio (to save time instead of building sets—TMC). In my book, it's the kind of pleasure that comes as a reward to old movie buffs and should not be missed.