Rags to Riches to the Ring
Another movie that seems like play like an Elvis movie, sans Elvis, this time featuring the effervescent Connie Francis. Oddly enough, despite the dumb script and sort of weird presentation of the star as a second banana, one gets a vague hint than in an alternate universe Connie Francis could've been a dramatic actress. She manages to project desperation in a few scenes in a sort of scary way.
This movie is also a curiosity for the fake late show TV appearances -- Johnny Carson and Danny Thomas -- in the era when Jay Leno appears in every third movie that comes out, hard to remember the beginnings of crossover promotion.
The plot is a typical romantic cross, and it didn't shock me too much to find the screenwriter, Ruth Brooks Flippen, was a writer on both the Gidget movies and the TV show, (as well as a few other notables, e.g. Bewitched) sequeing later to the Odd Couple. It made me want to learn a bit more about her.
If you already like Connie Francis, this will be a delight, and if you're interested in the mating habits of your parents (at least superficially), there are worse ways of spending an hour and a half.
This movie is also a curiosity for the fake late show TV appearances -- Johnny Carson and Danny Thomas -- in the era when Jay Leno appears in every third movie that comes out, hard to remember the beginnings of crossover promotion.
The plot is a typical romantic cross, and it didn't shock me too much to find the screenwriter, Ruth Brooks Flippen, was a writer on both the Gidget movies and the TV show, (as well as a few other notables, e.g. Bewitched) sequeing later to the Odd Couple. It made me want to learn a bit more about her.
If you already like Connie Francis, this will be a delight, and if you're interested in the mating habits of your parents (at least superficially), there are worse ways of spending an hour and a half.
- wall17
- Mar 15, 2004