SYNOPSIS: Gangster's dog escapes from his trainer and follows Farley Granger home. Wife Shelley Winters thinks dog is an anniversary present, little knowing gangsters are in hot pursuit . . .
COMMENT: An amusingly off-beat farce that deftly combines comic cops and robbers with domestic squabbles. Beck's stylishly fast-paced direction helps to overcome some over-talkative passages in his script. The cast is as fine a collection of character players as you could gather together, while Miss Winters and Mr Granger do well by the lead roles. Production values are A-l, with a special commendation to photographer James Wong Howe for his polished camerawork and J. McMillan Johnson for his excellent sets.
OTHER VIEWS: Joseph McMillan Johnson was a young architecture graduate when he worked as an assistant to William Cameron Menzies on Gone With The Wind. By 1951, he had become a leading architect. Beck deserves the credit of luring him back to films with the challenging assignment of creating a "Honeymoon House" for this amusing yet stylish film. Johnson subsequently worked on such movies as To Catch A Thief, The Facts of Life, Mutiny on the Bounty and The Greatest Story Ever Told.
James Wong Howe's photography is also a major asset. Although he never mentioned the film in interviews (preferring He Ran All the Way and The Brave Bulls as more representative of his 1951 work) his skill shines through every frame.
Farley Granger is well cast as the dumb-cluck husband, while Shelley Winters fills the part of his young wife more than adequately. The gangsters are a joy (particularly Hans Conried and Francis L. Sullivan), opposing William Demarest in a made-to-order role as a fumbling, fulminating plainclothesman.
COMMENT: An amusingly off-beat farce that deftly combines comic cops and robbers with domestic squabbles. Beck's stylishly fast-paced direction helps to overcome some over-talkative passages in his script. The cast is as fine a collection of character players as you could gather together, while Miss Winters and Mr Granger do well by the lead roles. Production values are A-l, with a special commendation to photographer James Wong Howe for his polished camerawork and J. McMillan Johnson for his excellent sets.
OTHER VIEWS: Joseph McMillan Johnson was a young architecture graduate when he worked as an assistant to William Cameron Menzies on Gone With The Wind. By 1951, he had become a leading architect. Beck deserves the credit of luring him back to films with the challenging assignment of creating a "Honeymoon House" for this amusing yet stylish film. Johnson subsequently worked on such movies as To Catch A Thief, The Facts of Life, Mutiny on the Bounty and The Greatest Story Ever Told.
James Wong Howe's photography is also a major asset. Although he never mentioned the film in interviews (preferring He Ran All the Way and The Brave Bulls as more representative of his 1951 work) his skill shines through every frame.
Farley Granger is well cast as the dumb-cluck husband, while Shelley Winters fills the part of his young wife more than adequately. The gangsters are a joy (particularly Hans Conried and Francis L. Sullivan), opposing William Demarest in a made-to-order role as a fumbling, fulminating plainclothesman.