Andy Hardy Comes Home

In his autobiography, Mickey Rooney indicated he had high hopes for this movie but really hated what it turned out to be. He didn't say why, but I have to agree with his sentiments. It's a downer.

The Andy Hardy films of the '30s and '40s had an abundance of humor, or at least good humor. And a lot of the magic was the town of Carvel itself. It was an earlier version of TV's Mayberry -- a gentle, peaceful place that anyone would love to call home. In this movie, however, Carvel is a gloomy little backwater, left behind by postwar prosperity. You can't blame Andy for wanting to rescue it, even if his plan for accomplishing that is dubious.

If you're an Andy Hardy fan, you'll want to see this film out of a certain kind of loyalty. But don't expect it to be fun.

This movie hails from a time when MGM had fallen on hard times and was looking to relive it's glory days of the 30's and 40's by creating new versions of it's classic films. The Andy Hardy series was the role of Mickey Rooney's career. This film was a nice effort. A shame Lewis Stone who played Judge Hardy passed away in 1953, his absence really hurt this 1958 remake. Ann Rutherford's absence as Andy's old love Polly Benedict also hurt this film. This is strictly a trip down memory lane movie for old Andy Hardy fans. The problem is it is rarely shown. I saw it last one Saturday in 1987 and have not seen it since. Turner Classic Movies which owns the series does show the older Andy Hardy movies but not this one.

It's now been 12 years since the last Andy Hardy movie-Love Laughs at Andy Hardy. At the end of that one, Andrew swore to his father-in front of pictures of his past girlfriends-he'd never go crazy over a woman again. Well, we find out in this one he eventually settled with one named Jane (Patricia Breslin) who bore him two kids, Cricket (Gina Gillespie) and Andy Jr. (played by Mickey Rooney's own son, Teddy). We also find out he moved to LA and is now coming back to his hometown of Carvel in order to work out a deal to build a factory there as a lawyer representing a plane company. Nice reunion with Fay Holden as his mom, Sara Haden as Aunt Milly (who it seems is still unmarried), and sis Marian (Cecilia Parker). Looks like other older sis Joan from A Family Affair is conveniently forgotten. (Chuck Cunninghamed, in other words!) No Judge Hardy since Lewis Stone had long passed but his portrait is prominently displayed in his room so that was a nice touch. Also nice to see those pictures of those old girlfriends since they are of Big Stars before becoming so though a little retconning was done concerning Judy Garland's character Betsy Booth since the clip shown of her with Mickey wasn't from any of the series entries but from the musical Babes in Arms. (With Mickey dubbing "Betsy" in place of the actual name of Judy's character there!) Also, before the clip of Mickey with Lana Turner was shown, his friend Beezy (played not by the actor who portrayed him in the previous series entries-George Breakston-but by someone who was Rooney's co-star in a TV series years earlier-Joey Forman) mistakenly ID'd her as a blonde and not a redhead as she was referred as in Love Finds Andy Hardy. As with the previous one-Love Laughs at Andy Hardy-there's a little joke done about Rooney's height when contrasted with someone way taller. In LLAAH, it was Dorothy Ford he towered under, here it's Johnny Weissmuller Jr. as his nephew, Jim. He's probably the weakest of the new players especially during a later sequence when he decides to play music at the Hardy home-when much of the family is gone-while Andy's children are asleep there which he acknowledges to his friends beforehand! Jerry Colonna makes a nice appearance as a soda jerk proprietor who's known Andy for years despite this being his only appearance in the series. It's during this sequence that Andy cuts a little rug with the teens there before "splitting". As series reunions go, this wasn't bad though I had to wonder why Ann Rutherford wouldn't even make a brief appearance as former girlfriend Polly Benedict. I know she didn't think she should be married to Andy but couldn't they have briefly talked about what they've been doing since the last time they saw each other? Oh, and why wasn't the original David Snell theme music used? Okay, in summary, Andy Hardy Comes Home was pretty enjoyable but its time was long past and didn't warrant a "To Be Continued" to be used at the end of this one.

Let me now make note of what happened to the series players: Fay Holden retired after this and died on June 23, 1973.

Sara Haden guested on various TV series before retiring in 1965. She died on September 15, 1981.

Cecilia Parker rarely acted after this, her last role being in 1984. She passed away on July 25, 1993.

What can one say about Mickey Rooney that hasn't been said many times before. Well, he has worked the longest in film having started when a toddler during the '20s up to the time before his death when he appeared in Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb. When it was released months after his death on April 6, 2014, it carried a dedication to him as well as Robin Williams who also died after filming his appearance in it but before its release. So with that, we say goodbye to Judge Hardy's Family from the town of Carvel....

After an absence of fourteen years, the Andy Hardy series is resumed with this attempt to regain the magic of the previous fifteen episodes. A series of flashbacks reminds the viewer of the beautiful and talented women who were Andy's former flames. Most of the original cast returns. But this film feels entirely different.

The original script would have had Andy reconnect with Polly, but instead he returns to dear old Carvel a married man, with a family on the west coast. And I am glad for the change, because I never thought of Polly as a pleasant, reliable young woman.

The story is about Andy returning home on a business trip, to locate land for a manufacturing plant. His efforts are thwarted by an unscrupulous businessman and small-town fears. Andy yearns to rediscover the hometown of his youth, but finds that emotional ties can fray.

The story lacks the energy and comedy of the earlier Andy Hardy installments. And the dramatic tension is rather weak, despite intimations that Andy's job is on the line. Still, it's fun to see Andy Hardy again, now serving as head of the family patriarchy.

As a way to tie up the loose ends of the series this average entry is a passable movie but the old spark is gone. Easy to see why this was the final film of the run.

The clips hearkening back to previous Hardy adventures (really just an excuse to remind the viewer that Judy Garland, Lana Turner and Esther Williams had appeared in the films) only emphasizes how modest this one is. Nothing against the actress who plays Andy's wife but it is too bad that they couldn't convince Ann Rutherford to return as Polly Benedict as Mrs. Hardy which any fan of the series expected.

For series fans a nice piece of nostalgia but that's about it.