Hotel delle vergini

Honeymoon Hotel came on my TCM channel today via Hulu. I was answering email when I looked up. My jaw dropped. The apartment swinging bachelors, Robert Goulet and Robert Morse, are sharing is the exact same set used in an MGM movie a few years earlier: Sunday in New York (a far better film). The efficiency kitchen is a step-down from the living room, and the spiral stair case leading to the bedroom. Check. There's even a brief moment with a look inside the living room closet where Jane Fonda hung her mother's bathrobe to ward off amorous suitors. Only a year separates the two films. I purposely went to the "Did You Know?" section of Honeymoon Hotel page to see if anyone else noticed, and indeed they have. Only one year separates these two movies--Sunday in New was released in 1963. MGM must have really felt a budget crunch by then.

Anyway, this film just gets more tired and predictable as it goes along. Poor Robert Goulet--this was his film debut. Robert Morse had already made one prior film to this. I'll bet both wish they hadn't landed in this picture. I love Jill St. John. She's gorgeous, and can play the dumb redhead in her sleep. (she has a fantastically high IQ). But this movie doesn't ask anything more than to wear tight dresses and act like a really dumb readhead. The wink-wink gay subtext is offensively applied with a trowel here.

A couple of Broadway names, Robert Goulet from Camelot and Robert Morse from How To Succeed In Business, star in Honeymoon Hotel in an attempt to make film stars of both. The two never did become box office together or separately.

Poor Bobby Morse gets jilted at the altar, but best man Goulet decides since we've got our reservations at a Honeymoon Hotel in the Carribean. Of course in those days before same sex marriage they have their problems. Goulet has an agenda, he's pursuing his boss's side dish Jill St. John. The boss is Keenan Wynn and you can't blame him for his indiscretion being married to harriden Elvia Allman.

Bob and Bob try an awful lot to get that Bing and Bob effect, but it doesn't go over quite so well with them. The Dorothy Lamour of the piece is hotel recreation director Nancy Kwan who has some real nice moves on the dance floor.

But one should never pass up an opportunity to see Jill St.John playing one of her patented bimbos.

Nice film, but Goulet and Morse will never be Crosby and Hope.

A 60's sex farce with little charm, mainly because the male characters are so unlikeable. Robert Goulet plays a guy who deliberately prevents his friend (Robert Morse) from reconciling with his fiancée so that he can try to score with a woman he's fallen for (Nancy Kwan). His boss comes to the same place with one of his lovers, and both his boss's wife and his friend's fiancée show up, thus setting off mayhem/musical chairs as the horny men try to not to get caught with the wrong women.

To its credit, the film's interracial romance is presented as any other, but it's hard to understand why Kwan's character would be attracted to Goulet's, and certainly hard to root for him. Jill St. John plays the lover and she does what she can, but her character is so ditzy and her big moment ends up being running into a plate glass window with her breasts. And then of course, the wife and fiancée characters are shrews. Kwan gets a scene to show off some dance moves, which was one of the few highlights. Also look for Elsa Lanchester as the chambermaid, and note the apartment set was the same used in 'Sunday in New York' a year earlier.

Just one of oh so many of those not so funny comedy capers where the guys (Robert Morse, Robert Goulet and the big boss Keenan Wynn) are trying to enjoy some harmless cheap flings and cheat on their significant others, all the while their significant others seem to always be a step behind these clumsy men.

Eventually the three (3) men and their significant others (Nancy Kwan, Elvia Allman, and Chris Noel) all end up in the same hotel suite with a very tipsy and very hot looking Jill St. John and the boys have some explaining to do.

The movie is quite boring and with very plastic acting. I wouldn't recommend it even though everyone seems to end up happy at the Honeymoon Hotel.

A 5 out of 10 rating

Hen-pecked Jay Menlow (Robert Morse) is marrying Cynthia Hampton. He and his womanizing friend Ross Kingsley (Robert Goulet) are caught commenting on other women. She cancels the wedding. Ross convinces him to go on the honeymoon anyways. The two guys arrive at the Boca Roca Hotel, but it's strictly for honeymooners only. The hotel insists on it. Ross is taken with social director Lynn Jenley (Nancy Kwan) and refuses to leave. She happens to be Cynthia's friend. Jay starts to crack, but Ross sabotages his reconciliation with Cynthia. Ross needs more time chasing Lynn.

I really like this movie until a certain point in the middle. I don't like what Lynn does after finding out Ross. There are many ways to get revenge on him. She picks the wrong path. It's not vicious enough. I would suggest stealing his big black book and start wrecking havoc on his life. It goes down the wrong path and the story thread comes to a dead end. This has some fun as a screwball sex comedy. More importantly, it has an inter-racial romance without making a big deal out of it. It does have some issues, but it is still good light fun.