Eight on the Lam

What do you get if you have Bob Hope, Phyllis Diller and. Jonathan Winters all together - you have a very funny movie.

The movie is about a widower - Bob Hope, who has seven children and a dog; who works as an accountant at a local bank. One day he finds a lot of money. By coincidence, it is discovered that $50,000 has been.embezzled at the same bank that Hope works at. You guessed it, the bank believes that Hope has stolen the money.

Fearing that he will be arrested, he gathers up his seven children and the dog; and hits the road.

The movie is full of skits and site gags; featuring the very talented comedians of Hope, Diller and Winters. It reminded me of a Jerry Lewis movie.

Well worth watching.

This is a classic -- if predictable -- 60s comedy, complete with smart-aleck kids and Bob Hope's one-liners delivered in his deadpan style. Like the big family in "Yours, Mine and Ours" some of the kids just stand around and we're to blithely accept the fact that middle-class families reproduce like rabbits, but those of us with *only* three or four kids can still identify.

Unlike the Disney movies of the same era, or the Hepburn-Tracy movies of a few years prior, the situations, clothes, and other styles truly reflect middle-class America. Oh, and it's actually funny!

In a plot borrowed somewhat from Double Dynamite, bank teller Bob Hope finds $10,000.00 in thousand dollar Grover Cleveland notes in a parking lot. He's real happy until it's discovered at his bank that they're short $50,000.00 in their books. Who seems to have come into some money? Nobody but old ski nose so he has to take it on the lam.

That's not easy considering he's a widower with seven kids. Hope's also got a babysitter played by Phyllis Diller. He leaves her behind, but she proves to be quite an asset behind enemy lines so to speak, especially with her cop boyfriend, Jonathan Winters.

Bob Hope gets only about a third of the laughs with Diller and Winters nicely splitting the rest. Winters does a repeat of his role as the dim bulb truck driver from It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World only here he's a dim bulb of a cop. If it isn't Hope, it's Diller constantly getting the better of him. Winters does a cameo appearance also as is own mother in that little old lady masquerade he was known for.

Of course the mystery is solved, in this case almost by sheer dumb luck and Hope winds up with school teacher Shirley Eaton and Diller with Winters despite all her obstruction of justice. It's how it is done that you have to see the film for.

Look also for a nice performance by Jill St. John as the gold digging femme fatale who inspires embezzlement. Eight on the Lam is nicely directed by comedy veteran George Marshall who's put Hope through all his paces before. It's a bit better than most of Hope's later work in the sixties.

Bob Hope, Phyllis Diller and director George Marshall("Monsieur Beaucaire", "Fancy Pants") reunited for their second film as a team after the abysmal "Boy, Did I Get A Wrong Number!" "Eight on the Lam" is definitely an improvement over their first film together but that's not saying much. "Lam"'s harmless enough and watchable in a "Brady Bunch"/"Yours, Mine and Ours" kind of way if you catch it on a late night TV movie run. But it's never really "good" in the way Hope's best comedies were and still are. I recommend watching a true Hope classic like 1943's "They Got Me Covered" or 1951's "My Favorite Spy" instead.

Best part of "Eight on the Lam": the novelty value of seeing 2 classic era James Bond girls, Jill St. John alias Tiffany Case from 1971's "Diamonds Are Forever" and Shirley Eaton a.k.a. Jill Masterson the "Golden Girl" from 1964's "Goldfinger", in the same film and even briefly in the same scene! Hope obviously exercised his producer power by casting Miss Eaton as his devoted love interest and she is given a decent amount of on-screen time.

Bottom line: ** out of ****, mainly for Shirley and Jill.

My impressions from this movie is, Great Cars, God awful furniture (I wouldn't even offer it to my friends), Clothes are funky, and Humor is timeless!. This a great movie to watch for a time capsule of 1967. Bob Hope is funny (Korny), and J. Winters and P. Diller both do a great job of being weirder than life as supporting characters. Tina Louise sure did a good job as the "hot" babe too. don't expect a complicated story, this is a HAHAHA movie worth seeing