Producer: Preston Sturges. Copyright 5 January 1944 by Paramount Pictures, Inc. New York opening at the Paramount: 19 January 1944. U.S. release: January 1944. Australian release: 20 April 1944. 10 reels. 8,869 feet. 100 minutes. (Available on an excellent Paramount DVD).
SYNOPSIS: In the small town of Morgan's Creek lives Trudy Kockenlocker (Betty Hutton), who works in a music store and whose father, Officer Kockenlocker (William Demarest) is the traffic policeman and a sergeant of the last war. Little sister Emmy (Diana Lynn) is worldly wise and sharp-tongued and Trudy's boy friend, Norval Jones (Eddie Bracken), is a bashful guy who works in the town bank.
Norval would like Trudy to go to the movies with him the evening the story opens, but Trudy is sorry, she is going to dance with the soldiers. Norval can't be talked into going to this dance because he's long wanted to be in uniform, but every time he tries to enlist he gets so nervous, up goes his blood pressure and spots appear before his eyes.
NOTES: Second to "Going My Way" as Paramount's top domestic box- office successes of 1944. Initial box-office gross: over $10 million. Nominated for a prestigious Hollywood award for Original Screenplay, losing to Lamar Trotti's "Wilson". Number 3 on the National Board of Review's list of the Ten Best Movies of 1944. Betty Hutton was cited by the National Board of Review (along with nine other players) for the year's Best Acting. One of Bosley Crowther's Top Ten for The New York Times, in fact "the year's best farce". Re-made in 1958 as "Rock-a- bye Baby".
COMMENT: How this movie got past the Hays Office, was something that puzzled all reviewers from New York to Los Angeles. The answer, of course, is simple. Censorial bodies are not only blind and deaf, they have absolutely no common sense. Did you notice the heroine's name? If you still haven't got the joke, just say her name out loud. And this is just the start. You wouldn't believe how many times this name is repeated in the movie. I would say at least forty times. Maybe even fifty?
I first saw this movie at a revival in the early 1950s. To my surprise, the usually half-empty suburban theater was packed to the doors and every time, our heroine's name was mentioned - which, as I aid before, was at least forty times - the whole theater just exploded with laughter. In fact, there was one particularly long scene between the hero and the heroine's dad, in which our hero answered a multitude of questions from his soon to be father-in-law by consistently addressing him as "Mr. Kockenlocker!" The whole theater just exploded with continuous laughter. A few of us even fell off our chairs!
OTHER VIEWS: "Excellent. The funniest picture of this year, or any other year within memory." — Archer Winsten in N.Y. Post.
"Situations spark, dialogue crackles and the Sturges camera works like a playful Peeping Tom." — Bosley Crowther in N.Y. Times.
"One of the funniest pictures I've ever seen in a long span of viewing and reviewing." — Film Daily.
"I am still hysterical over The Miracle of Morgan's Creek. It is the funniest picture I ever saw. I'd never laughed so much in all my life." — Lee Mortimer in N.Y. Daily Mirror.
P.S. I'd like to give the movie 10/10, but it is so brazen - and this one play-on-words is repeated at least forty times - I just can't bring myself to rub it in!
SYNOPSIS: In the small town of Morgan's Creek lives Trudy Kockenlocker (Betty Hutton), who works in a music store and whose father, Officer Kockenlocker (William Demarest) is the traffic policeman and a sergeant of the last war. Little sister Emmy (Diana Lynn) is worldly wise and sharp-tongued and Trudy's boy friend, Norval Jones (Eddie Bracken), is a bashful guy who works in the town bank.
Norval would like Trudy to go to the movies with him the evening the story opens, but Trudy is sorry, she is going to dance with the soldiers. Norval can't be talked into going to this dance because he's long wanted to be in uniform, but every time he tries to enlist he gets so nervous, up goes his blood pressure and spots appear before his eyes.
NOTES: Second to "Going My Way" as Paramount's top domestic box- office successes of 1944. Initial box-office gross: over $10 million. Nominated for a prestigious Hollywood award for Original Screenplay, losing to Lamar Trotti's "Wilson". Number 3 on the National Board of Review's list of the Ten Best Movies of 1944. Betty Hutton was cited by the National Board of Review (along with nine other players) for the year's Best Acting. One of Bosley Crowther's Top Ten for The New York Times, in fact "the year's best farce". Re-made in 1958 as "Rock-a- bye Baby".
COMMENT: How this movie got past the Hays Office, was something that puzzled all reviewers from New York to Los Angeles. The answer, of course, is simple. Censorial bodies are not only blind and deaf, they have absolutely no common sense. Did you notice the heroine's name? If you still haven't got the joke, just say her name out loud. And this is just the start. You wouldn't believe how many times this name is repeated in the movie. I would say at least forty times. Maybe even fifty?
I first saw this movie at a revival in the early 1950s. To my surprise, the usually half-empty suburban theater was packed to the doors and every time, our heroine's name was mentioned - which, as I aid before, was at least forty times - the whole theater just exploded with laughter. In fact, there was one particularly long scene between the hero and the heroine's dad, in which our hero answered a multitude of questions from his soon to be father-in-law by consistently addressing him as "Mr. Kockenlocker!" The whole theater just exploded with continuous laughter. A few of us even fell off our chairs!
OTHER VIEWS: "Excellent. The funniest picture of this year, or any other year within memory." — Archer Winsten in N.Y. Post.
"Situations spark, dialogue crackles and the Sturges camera works like a playful Peeping Tom." — Bosley Crowther in N.Y. Times.
"One of the funniest pictures I've ever seen in a long span of viewing and reviewing." — Film Daily.
"I am still hysterical over The Miracle of Morgan's Creek. It is the funniest picture I ever saw. I'd never laughed so much in all my life." — Lee Mortimer in N.Y. Daily Mirror.
P.S. I'd like to give the movie 10/10, but it is so brazen - and this one play-on-words is repeated at least forty times - I just can't bring myself to rub it in!