Oh, great. Another movie from the Olden Times. Sigh. Let's get this over with.
Plot summary (with spoilers): David Huxley is a paleontologist, which is like a dinosaur guy. He's futzing around his...lab, I guess, putting together the bones of a brontosaurus. He announces to his comely assistant that he needs one more bone--the intercostal clavicle--to complete the dinosaur, and it's arriving by mail later that day. He tries to kiss his comely assistant, Alice Swallow, but she demurs. It's true they are to be married the next day, but she lets him know that their marriage is one of convenience at that there will be no Honeymoon, because he has work to do with his brontosaurus. David's disappointed, but agrees that it's for the best. Alice further exposits that he has an important golf date that very afternoon with a lawyer named Alexander Peabody, who is considering giving David's museum a million dollar grant. David allows himself to be led around by the nose by this chick.
While golfing, David keeps hitting up Peabody for the cash until Peabody first tells him that A) You don't discuss business during golf and B) He personally doesn't have any cash, he's just a lawyer who advices his client, Mrs. Random (heh, "random") on how to spend her money. David hits his ball, and then notices up ahead that someone is trying to play his ball as their own. He runs up to the comely young woman (Susan Vance) and sputters "now see here!" and all that, and the comely young woman basically ignores him and continues playing through after shushing him. David insists that the ball is his, and tries to prove it by pointing out the markings on it. Susan says she's done golfing for the day, and heads over to the parking lot. David goes back to Mr. Peabody, but then notices Susan is getting into his car. He runs back over in time to see Susan pull out, cut the turn too close, and crunch into the car next to his. He flips out, does the "now see here!" thing again, but she smiles the whole time and acts like he's the crazy one and eventually drives off with David in pursuit.
At a restaurant, later that night. Susan is at the bar, flirting with the bartender. She's got these really weird ribbons in her hair that stick way out in front of her on either side. She's attempting to catch olives in her mouth (a trick the bartender taught her) and drops one. Of course, David happens by at that moment, and slips on the olive, crushing his hat. Susan apologizes, her laughter undercutting any expression of remorse, and David harumphs and continues on his way. Susan follows him for a bit, then stops in front of a table where a man is eating olives. She tries to catch several in her mouth, to his bewilderment. Then she sits at his table and asks his name. It's Dr. Fritz Lehman, a psychiatrist. "Oh, you mean for crazy people!" Not cool, Susan. Susan asks Lehman to psychoanalyze a man who is obsessed with a woman he just met, even though he's constantly fighting with her. Lehman says "the love impulse in men frequently reveals itself in conflict". Susan lights up. "The love impulse!" "Yes, and further studies show..." "No wait, I can't remember any more than that!" She dashes off, and races over to David, who is waiting to meet with Peabody. She tells him that his love impulse frequently reveals itself in conflict and that's why he's following her. David is flabbergasted, due to her being totally wrong on all counts. Susan looks at the purse she's holding. She says excuse me, hands the purse to David, and runs away again.
At the table, Dr. Lehman's wife returns from the powder room and discovers her purse is gone. David walks by to pursue Susan, and Mrs. Lehman exclaims, "that's my purse!" and tries to take it from him. David thinks it's Susan's, and won't budge, until finally Susan comes back from the bar with her own purse and angrily chides David for stealing Mrs. Lehman's. David hands the purse to Mrs. Lehman, and stomps off. Susan tries to stop him and accidentally rips his coat. He tells her to scram, and when she does, she doesn't notice he's standing on her dress. It rips and then it's up to David to walk right up behind her as they quickly exit the restaurant. Of course, Mr. Peabody arrives right then, and sees them both marching out.
It's the next morning, and David is getting ready for his wedding. The phone rings. It's Susan. Dear God, why did he give her his number? She explains that she recently came in possession of a leopard named Baby. (Uh...) The leopard was sent to her by her brother Mark, who lives in Brazil. She says that since he's a zoologist, he should come and pick it up and study it. David says he's not a zoologist, and please stop calling! Susan trips on the phone cord and cries out. David asks if the leopard is attacking her. Susan says yes, that's totally what's going on right now, and then runs the phone along the vent on the floor, which is how you simulate a leopard attack. She then screams and hangs up the phone.
David races over to her apartment and she lets him in. Are you okay? Where's the leopard?! I'm fine. David thinks there's no leopard, but sure enough, there is one, who is quite tame and takes an instant liking to David's pantleg. The freaking leopard is real, no CGI obviously. I'm sure they are breaking a ton of union laws. David stomps off again, telling her not to bother him anymore, and he's got to get married. Susan's next big plan is to have Baby follow David on the street, while she drives along side him in her car. When David sees Baby walking next to him, with Susan threatening to drive off, he realizes he has no choice but to get in the car with her and Baby. (Yeah, that makes zero sense, anyway you slice it. Let's just go with it). Susan wants to drive Baby to her aunt's house in Connecticut. David says okay, but he need to hurry back blah blah married!
On the way to Connecticut, they stop off to buy Baby some raw meat. David buys the meat, and then Susan gets hassled by a cop for parking at a fire hydrant. She says that's not her car and then proves it by stealing the car next to hers and then picking up David in front of the butcher shop. Susan is a straight-up sociopath, you guys. I love it. Once they get to the farm, Susan convinces David to take a shower before he leaves. She steals his clothes while he's showering and gives them to her aunt's maid to take into town and have them cleaned and pressed.
Oh yeah, and David also has his intercoastal clavicle bone that he got in the mail earlier that day. Susan opens it up and asks about it when he's in the shower. Then she leaves it on the bed.
David realizes his clothes are gone and puts on a frilly nightgown that's in the room. He calls out for Susan, who barricades herself in her own bathroom and starts showering, to avoid a confrontation about the clothes.
Just then, Susan's aunt arrives home, with a little yapping dog. She demands to know who David is and why he's wearing her nightgown. He ignores her questions at first until finally he shouts "Because I just went gay all of a sudden!"
(In 1938, holy crap. Coincidence? Did he mean "happy"? Wiki says that gay men were using the term "gay" to mean "homosexual" as far back as the twenties, but most other people didn't know about that meaning for another fifty years. However, Cary Grant has been rumored to be gay, and he reportedly ad-libbed the line, so...who knows? Reminds me of this Seinfeld clip from September 1993. The date's important. The setup is that Elaine is dating a man who has the same name as a famous serial killer, Joel Rifkin, and she's trying to get him to change his name. Here's her suggestion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZx3xYwb64Q Ahem. Anyway).
Aunt Random continues haranguing David and the dog George keeps yapping. Susan runs out of her bedroom and lies for no reason to her Aunt, telling her that David is a crazy man whom she met recently and she's trying to convince him to get help, and also they're going to get married. At that, David has had enough! He demands that Aunt Random find him some male clothes, and she responds that the gardener Aloysius Gogarty (oh, fuck me!) sometimes leaves clothes here to change into in that room over there. David goes into the room, with the dog George yapping very loudly this whole time. George then races into the bedroom where the intercoastal clavicle bone is, grabs it, then heads outside. Once David changes clothes, he realizes the intercoastal clavicle bone is gone! Susan suspects George took it, while David quite reasonably suspects Susan took it. At any rate, they go outside and begin following George around the yard, waiting to see where he might have hidden the intercoastal clavicle bone. It is then that Susan takes the opportunity to inform David that her Aunt Random is the very wealthy socialite that the lawyer Mr. Peabody works for. The one whom David needs a million dollars from. David is stunned. He realizes he's made too bad of a first impression and orders Susan not to tell her aunt who he really is. Aunt Random goes out into the yard with them. As David runs off after George, she asks Susan what his name is and what he does for a living. Susan responds that his name is David...Bone. And he hunts. What does he hunt? Well, animals I'd hope!
David gives up on George for the time being and goes inside to call Alice and explain the wedding will have to be postponed. Susan gets on the other line and starts talking to Alice. David barks at her to get off the line! Then she pretends that she's the automated time lady (?!?!) and starts melodically saying "at the tone...the time will be...seven fifteen and twenty seconds...ding" and so on. She's by the window in the living room as she does this, and suddenly a man's head pops up and says, "excuse me, it's actually ten after eight!" Susan adjusts the time in her next go round, then hangs up. She calls to her Aunt who hurries into the living room to greet their new guest named...wait for it...Major Horace Applegate. He's there to have dinner, because why the fuck not? Horace is a friend of Aunt Random's and also a...yes...big game hunter.
Later that night, the four of them are having dinner. David barely tracks the conversation, and keeps watching George. Every time George runs out of the kitchen, David excuses himself and follows. Aunt Random asks Susan if she really wants to marry a man who wanders about like Hamlet's father. Zing!
At this point, Aloysius Gogarty shows up, and starts tooling about in the barn. The barn where Baby is currently being held. Very quickly, Baby escapes. Aloysius sees her running, and is gobsmacked.
The quartet eating dinner hear Baby howling outside. Aunt Random wonders aloud what that could be, and Susan blurts out "a leopard!" Maj Applegate assures her that that isn't possible because the howling is all wrong, and he proceeds to do several quite hilarious leopard impressions while the rest watch. Aunt Random says that her nephew Mark was supposed to send her a leopard from Brazil, but it hasn't arrived yet. George leaves the kitchen again, David excuses himself and follows, and this time so does Susan. They race out of the house together. Maj Applegate suggests that perhaps dinner is over, and would Aunt Random like to go for a walk? She would. "Shall we run?" "Of course!" They also race out of the kitchen, in perfect imiation of David and Susan. This makes me giggle way too much.
Outside, David has lost track of George. Susan suggests they team up to find Baby and George, before they find each other and there's no more George. They go off into the woods together, and wind up falling down a little hill after getting caught in poison ivy. Being a sociopath, Susan can't stop laughing. Meanwhile, back at the house, Aloysius tells Maj Applegate that the leopard is real, and Applegate grabs his shotgun. They also go off into the woods, without telling Aunt Random.
David and Susan see Baby and George on the other side of a stream, wrestling and growling at each other. It's totally real, and damn that leopard must be well trained. David asks how can they get around the stream, and Susan assures him it's shallow and they can just wade across, so they march into the stream and...of course, under the water they go. By the time they've swam ashore, Baby and George are gone. After they dry off, they happen upon a truck in the road. The truck belongs to the circus that's in town (of course) and they're transporting a leopard to the circus right now (of course) and David and Susan think the leopard they have is Baby (OF COURSE THEY DO). David distracts them with bad directions, while Susan frees the leopard in the back of the truck. She tries to put a collar on it, but this leopard is not tame like Baby and snarls and growls at her. It runs away. She chases him, calling David to follow her. They run through the forest together, until Susan trips over a log. She jumps back up, but her heel is broken. This is what she says as she limps around in a circle: "Side of a mountain. Side of a mountain. I was born on the side of a mountain". OMG. Susan is KILLING me.
Gunshots. David and Susan run to the source of the shooting, and confront Applegate and Aloysius. Susan asks what they're doing. Applegate says he saw a leopard in the distance. Susan shouts that the leopard is tame and it belongs to Aunt Random. Don't kill it, capture it! She and David go off in one direction, while they other two go off in another. They happen upon the circus leopard and when Applegate tries to capture it, it growls at them both and chases them off screen. Again, no CGI. I hope these people were paid a lot.
David and Susan finally find George, and David scoops him up. They stumble upon a house and see Baby on the roof. Susan suggests they sing to her to make her come down. She and David harmonize together while George howls. David decides this isn't working and runs off to climb up on the roof. A man opens the window to his bedroom and peers out at Susan. "You there! Why are you singing?" "I have to sing to catch the leopard." The man says there's no leopard. She says there's one on his roof, and when he pshaws at that, she rolls her eyes and says "okay", like he's a nut or something. It is then that they recognize each other. Because yes, it's Dr. Fritz Lehman, the psychiatrist from Act One. Dr. Lehman disappears into the bedroom, and moments later he and his wife have come downstairs. He forcibly grabs Susan while telling his wife to call the police. As soon as they're in the house, David comes creeping around the corner, looking inside the house for Susan. A police car happens by at that exact moment. The cops see David looking inside, think he's a Peeping Tom, and arrest him on the spot.
At the local jail, David refuses to give his name, while Susan says she's Mrs. Random's niece. The police chief...Constable Slocum (you kind of punted on that one, movie, if the goal was to make the names more and more ridiculous) calls Mrs. Random, but she tells the police that her niece is in bed and not to bother her again. The cops then suddenly drag Aloysius into the cell next to Susan and David. They say he was with another man firing a shotgun in a residential area, but the other man ran away. And after some unfortunate bad old-timey movie acting from the Constable, (the only one in the whole movie who talks too fast, mugs, and generally acts like a guy from shitty old movies) Mrs. Random and Maj Applegate show up at the jail, after Applegate got home and explained what happened to Aloysius. The cops say he was the second guy who was shooting earlier, and they grab him as well. Mrs. Random starts hitting the cop with her purse, and boom! You guessed it.
Now with all the main characters in jail, the Constable starts questioning them. Every time someone brings up a leopard, he shuts down the conversation, not believing that such a thing is possible. And THEN, Susan starts talking like an old timey mob crook, like the ones in the "movie picture shows", according to David. Everyone is stunned. She tells the Constable if he takes her somewhere private she'll tell him about all the dirty mob dealings they're involved in. The Constable immediately believes her and takes her into his office. They're full-on parodying all the other shitty movies of the time. It's awesome. Anyway, Susan tricks the Constable into opening a window and when his back turns, she escapes.
More people arrive at the jail. It's Mr. Peabody and Alice Swallow, who were supposed to be late dinner guests at Aunt Random's house, and were directed here by the maid. Alice is shocked to see David there and asks what he's done to be locked up? "You name it, I've done it". Following Alice and Peabody into the jail are Baby and George. Everyone is scared of Baby except David, who announces that it's tame, and that it belongs to Aunt Random. Then the two guys from the circus show up to report their stolen leopard. Yes, that's right, the entire cast is now at the jail. LOVE IT. The guys accuse David of stealing their leopard, but David says they stole it first. The guys clarify that their leopard is not a tame Brazilian leopard, but a wild circus leopard, and no one could possibly catch it or steal it.
CUT TO--outside the jail, Susan is dragging the angry, snarling circus leopard on a leash. "Come on, Baby" she rolls her eyes. "What's wrong with you?"
She enters the jail and the shit hits the fan. EVERYBODY; the cops, the Constable, Major Applegate, Aunt Random, Aloysius, Mr. Peabody, Alice, and the circus workers freak the fuck out and start screaming bloody murder and running around like a bunch of nuts. Even George and Baby sprint away in fear. Susan doesn't know why everyone is so scared until she sees Baby running away and realizes the truth. David steps up with a chair. He stands in front of Susan as they back away. Susan blurts out, "I love you!" This scares David more than the leopard. David's able to coax the leopard into a cell. They lock him in. Crisis averted.
A week later, David is working on his bronto. He's up a scaffold high in the air, brushing the bones with that archeologist bone brush thingey. Susan enters. She has a surprise for him. It's the intercoastal clavicle bone, finally dug up by George. She tells David that she also got Aunt Random to agree to the million dollar grant. She climbs a ladder to hand David the bone, and he remarks on how it's taken him years to build this dino model. The ladder shakes. I think you can guess the rest.
Review: Well shit, that was a pleasant surprise! With the lone exception of the Constable, everyone in this movie said their lines in a natural way, and let the absurd situation and dialog get the laughs, instead of pushing for them. Katherine Hepburn was especially great. Her strange, somewhat robotic voice (even pre-Parkinson's) works perfectly here, and makes her lines seem very deadpan. Even the editing, while not excellent, if very sharp for an old movie. There's no weird pauses from the actors who think they're on stage rather than being filmed, or long static shots because they couldn't afford a lot of close-ups. I feel somewhat vindicated after reading about this on wiki, however. It seems the movie bombed when it came out, and was only appreciated for the classic it is decades later. This movie was way ahead of its time, both in the sophistication of the writing and acting. It only came out two years after the dreadful Swing Time, but it feels like a movie from a different planet. The audience didn't know what to make of it, and Katherine Hepburn was pronounced "box office poison" for years afterwards. It's basically as if every other TV show was Everybody Loves Raymond, and nobody was interested when something like Arrested Development came along. Fortunately, modern audiences would never be that undiscerning. That's why Community is the number one show in America and Two and a Half Men is always languishing at the bottom of the Nielsen ratings. Oh, wait. Also, because there's nowhere else to subtly name drop, I'll do it here. I was once in an improv class with Jennifer Grant, Cary's daughter.
Stars: Four out of five.
Does it deserve "Best 100" status: I need to be a little bit harder on these movies. Only Five Stars should get you "Best 100", no? While I liked this movie a lot more than I expected to, it wasn't really perfect. I think I would have a hard time giving any straight-up farce five stars. So, no. It doesn't deserve "Best 100" status. But I'm not angry that it has it.
Next "12 Angry Men" and then "Platoon". Winning!
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