Baby photographer Ronnie Jackson has always wanted to be a
private detective. When the attractive and mysterious Baroness Moray comes
through the office door of private eye Sam McCloud, who’s away on business,
Ronnie can’t help but have a go at playing detective. But soon it transpires
that Ronnie has jumped into more than he ever imagined as the caper consists of
a kidnapped Baron, an elaborate hoax to get land, and he himself gets framed
for murder.
This is a very funny and rollicking little movie that hardly lets
you have a moment to breathe. From the first shot of Death Row where our
protagonist awaits his death, My
Favourite Brunette just escalates higher and higher until even the ozone
layer can’t deter it from reaching the moon.
Baby photographer Ronnie Jackson
has always wanted to be a private detective. When the attractive and mysterious
Baroness Moray comes through the office door of private eye Sam McCloud, who’s
away on business, Ronnie can’t help but have a go at playing detective. But
soon it transpires that Ronnie has jumped into more than he ever imagined as
the caper consists of a kidnapped Baron, an elaborate hoax to get land, and he
himself gets framed for murder.
In the vein of classic plot misdirection,
misinterpretations, and mishaps, this movie stands as one that endures even
when the grainy black and white quality of it does not. The story is one that’s
as old as the hills, but it remains ever the comical classic with drama,
violence, and suspense sliding in seamlessly with the romance and the comedy. Told
as a flashback with occasional bouts of voice-over narration, it’s a film that
literally crams everything into it and the entire thing is a wonderfully
exciting and happy mess of adventures and misadventures.
Bob Hope stars as the
baby photographer himself, Ronnie Jackson, and he’s very funny! I was a bit freaked
out at the start because he reminds me of Quentin Tarantino (it’s in the chin
and the shape of the mouth), but once the story took hold I soon embraced his
performance that was filled with foolishness, testosterone, inadvertent strokes
of brilliance, and the constant stream of bad luck. Quite literally everything
that can go wrong this guy does go
wrong… and then some! And Bob deals with everything in a very unbelievable and
caricatured way, but it’s all very funny and compelling to watch. You just feel
so much for this guy!
Starring Dorothy Lamour, Peter Lorre, Lon Chaney Jr.,
John Hoyt, Charles Dingle, Reginald Denny, Frank Puglia, Ann Doran, Willard
Robertson, Charles Arnt, and Jack La Rue, My
Favourite Brunette is a wonderfully funny movie that keeps you at the edge
of your seat in a comic and schadenfreude-induced type of way. Filled with
action, murder, suspense, plot misdirection, romance, and comedy, I really
found it quite enjoyable and would readily watch it again.
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