Pleasing piece of yesteryear, a whimsical, contrived, and often extremely silly comedy from (of all people) director Joseph H. Lewis. Terry Moore is brash and appealing playing a headstrong, stubborn eighteen-year old girl facing a sanity hearing after her boyfriend, a campus psychologist, publishes a paper detailing her 'delusional' belief that a racehorse named October is her beloved deceased uncle come back to life; her relatives, greedy sorts who have been cut out of the last will of the lass's eccentric aunt, hope to put the kid away, but all she really wants is to race the horse in the Kentucky Derby! Typically overstuffed screenplay by Norman Panama and Melvin Frank has lots of lickety-split talk, a courtroom sequence played at breakneck speed, but much affection for its characters as well. Moore, with her red hair, wide eyes and fashionable jodhpurs, looks like Nicole Kidman's sassy kid sister; she often struggles with her reactions, and she's so alert that at times she appears to be staring blankly, however she acquits herself nicely with this role, and her romantic scenes with Glenn Ford are sweetly screwball. The big race finale isn't given the same care as the rest of the picture (it's pushed along and then cut a bit short), but then this isn't a teary, sentimental piece and the sub-plots are neatly tied up. Good fun! **1/2 from ****
7 Reviews
October on the first Saturday in May!
sol-kay10 January 2008
Warning: Spoilers
(There are Spoilers) Cute little movie about an old horse trainer who comes back,or does he, as a thoroughbred race horse to fulfill a life long dream, which he never lived to see in his previous incarnation,in wining the Kentucky Derby!
Uncle Willie Ramsey, James Gleason, wanted to get his horse Sunset into the big race at Rowland Park, The Imperial Handicap, so if he won he'd be qualified to race against the best three year old's in the country in the world famous Kentucky Derby. Taking the lead in the stretch Sunset was just about to hit the finish line when this young boy, trying to get the attention of the racehorse, threw a paper airplane in it's path spooking the animal and causing Sunset to breakdown losing the big race. Uncle Willie shocked at the bizarre circumstances of his horse's defeat collapsed and later died at Rowland Gereral Hospital from a massive heart-attack.
The sudden death of Uncle Willie left his niece Terry, Terry Moore, all alone and forced her to live with her wealthy Aunt Martha, Dame May Witty, and her stuffed up and greedy, waiting for Aunt Martha to finally kick off, cousins: Cousin Margaret, Victoria Horne, who drinks Cousin Therese, Nana Bryant, who doesn't but should and Cousin Johanthan, Byron Foulger, who does absolutely nothing!
A strange incident occurred about a year after Uncle Willie's death in that Terry attending a thoroughbred horse auction spotted this three year old bay colt named October! October was not only wearing a felt hat that Uncle Willie used to wear but was also allergic, like Uncle Willie, to the plant goldenrod and on top of all that the horse likes to listen to the late Uncle Willie's favorite radio show Amos & Andy! October also seemed to have a genuine attraction to Terry! Can it be that October is Uncle Willie in the "horse" flesh coming back as a horse to win his beloved Kentucky Derby?
Getting this "Snookle" of a psychology professor Bentley Bassett Jr, Glenn Ford, to buy October Terry plans to get the horse to run in the Derby and win it for Uncle Willie whom she believes has been reincarnated as the racehorse. Prof. Bassett who had an altercation, at the racetrack, with Terry earlier in the movie is using her for a thesis in human and animal psychology that he's writing for Rowland University.
It's that thesis that in the end would get Terry to resent that closed minded "Snookle", Prof. Bassett, in that it was used by her cousins and their corrupt family lawyer Mitchell, Fredric Tozewe, to prove her to be mentally unstable. Aunt Martha had since passed away and she left all her holdings to Terry since she was the only person who wasn't infatuated with her money like all the others in her will: The three cousin's and what turned to be that sneaky and embezzling, of her bank accounts, shyster Mitchell.
The movie ends on a both winning and bittersweet note with October not only running his heart out in winning the Kentucky Derby but Terry being vindicated, in her belief that the horse was really Uncle Wille, and thus proving that she was in fact normal. This happens when everyone at the race track, 82,000 strong, including the presiding judge at her sanity trial Judge Northridge, Samuel Hind, started cheering at the top of their lungs for the horse "Uncle Willie", not October, to win the race!
In the end even the "Snookle" Prof. Bassett believed that there's was something to Terry's strong belief in the Uncle Willie-October connection. It was just that he was so into his own small and narrow world of modern psychological research that he was,like a horse wearing blinders, totally blind to everything else that was, like reincarnation parapsychology or just plain magic, beyond it.
Uncle Willie Ramsey, James Gleason, wanted to get his horse Sunset into the big race at Rowland Park, The Imperial Handicap, so if he won he'd be qualified to race against the best three year old's in the country in the world famous Kentucky Derby. Taking the lead in the stretch Sunset was just about to hit the finish line when this young boy, trying to get the attention of the racehorse, threw a paper airplane in it's path spooking the animal and causing Sunset to breakdown losing the big race. Uncle Willie shocked at the bizarre circumstances of his horse's defeat collapsed and later died at Rowland Gereral Hospital from a massive heart-attack.
The sudden death of Uncle Willie left his niece Terry, Terry Moore, all alone and forced her to live with her wealthy Aunt Martha, Dame May Witty, and her stuffed up and greedy, waiting for Aunt Martha to finally kick off, cousins: Cousin Margaret, Victoria Horne, who drinks Cousin Therese, Nana Bryant, who doesn't but should and Cousin Johanthan, Byron Foulger, who does absolutely nothing!
A strange incident occurred about a year after Uncle Willie's death in that Terry attending a thoroughbred horse auction spotted this three year old bay colt named October! October was not only wearing a felt hat that Uncle Willie used to wear but was also allergic, like Uncle Willie, to the plant goldenrod and on top of all that the horse likes to listen to the late Uncle Willie's favorite radio show Amos & Andy! October also seemed to have a genuine attraction to Terry! Can it be that October is Uncle Willie in the "horse" flesh coming back as a horse to win his beloved Kentucky Derby?
Getting this "Snookle" of a psychology professor Bentley Bassett Jr, Glenn Ford, to buy October Terry plans to get the horse to run in the Derby and win it for Uncle Willie whom she believes has been reincarnated as the racehorse. Prof. Bassett who had an altercation, at the racetrack, with Terry earlier in the movie is using her for a thesis in human and animal psychology that he's writing for Rowland University.
It's that thesis that in the end would get Terry to resent that closed minded "Snookle", Prof. Bassett, in that it was used by her cousins and their corrupt family lawyer Mitchell, Fredric Tozewe, to prove her to be mentally unstable. Aunt Martha had since passed away and she left all her holdings to Terry since she was the only person who wasn't infatuated with her money like all the others in her will: The three cousin's and what turned to be that sneaky and embezzling, of her bank accounts, shyster Mitchell.
The movie ends on a both winning and bittersweet note with October not only running his heart out in winning the Kentucky Derby but Terry being vindicated, in her belief that the horse was really Uncle Wille, and thus proving that she was in fact normal. This happens when everyone at the race track, 82,000 strong, including the presiding judge at her sanity trial Judge Northridge, Samuel Hind, started cheering at the top of their lungs for the horse "Uncle Willie", not October, to win the race!
In the end even the "Snookle" Prof. Bassett believed that there's was something to Terry's strong belief in the Uncle Willie-October connection. It was just that he was so into his own small and narrow world of modern psychological research that he was,like a horse wearing blinders, totally blind to everything else that was, like reincarnation parapsychology or just plain magic, beyond it.
Broadway Deeds
bkoganbing14 May 2011
Since Mr. Deeds Goes To Town and Broadway Bill were owned by Columbia Pictures, I'm figuring that Harry Cohn thought he could do just about anything he wanted with those two Frank Capra classics. But it might have been nice if Capra and authors Clarence Buddington Kelland and Damon Runyon got some kind of acknowledgment in the credits for The Return Of October. Elements of both films are combined in the plot of The Return Of October.
Young Terry Moore has grown up around racetracks being raised by her uncle Willie played by James Gleason who is a track character. All his life he's wanted like millions of other owners to own and train a Kentucky Derby winner. But he dies before he accomplishes the goal.
Ms. Moore goes to live with her rich aunt Dame May Witty in what was her farewell screen role, but can't keep away from the track. With the help of Deeds like psychology professor Glenn Ford she buys a race horse who with certain mannerisms and incidents Moore thinks is James Gleason returned.
Ford's got those publish or perish problems that university professors perennially have and he hits upon the idea of publishing a paper on Terry Moore's obsession about the horse being her reincarnated uncle. In this he's unwittingly used like Jean Arthur's articles to bring Gary Cooper down by some unscrupulous relatives of Moore and Witty when Witty passes away.
If you've seen Mr. Deeds Goes To Town and Broadway Bill you know exactly where this whole story is going and how it will end.
The Return Of October does not come anywhere near being the classic that either of those films does. It still is an enjoyable fantasy with a lot of very good players penciled into parts that fit them well. I'm only sorry the story called for James Gleason to die so soon because he's always fun.
One of the great Hollywood stories that Frank Capra told was how Harry Cohn had stuck Capra's name on another film from Columbia to boost it in overseas markets. This caused Capra to leave Columbia when his contract was up, but the real upshot of that story was that Cohn would not even see that he did anything wrong.
Bearing that in mind it certainly is easy to see how Cohn could take two Capra classics and rework them and not give Capra nor two distinguished authors any credit at all.
The film was shot at Santa Anita racetrack with some establishing shots of Churchill Downs for the climax.
The Return Of October is no classic, but a pleasant piece of entertainment in any event.
Young Terry Moore has grown up around racetracks being raised by her uncle Willie played by James Gleason who is a track character. All his life he's wanted like millions of other owners to own and train a Kentucky Derby winner. But he dies before he accomplishes the goal.
Ms. Moore goes to live with her rich aunt Dame May Witty in what was her farewell screen role, but can't keep away from the track. With the help of Deeds like psychology professor Glenn Ford she buys a race horse who with certain mannerisms and incidents Moore thinks is James Gleason returned.
Ford's got those publish or perish problems that university professors perennially have and he hits upon the idea of publishing a paper on Terry Moore's obsession about the horse being her reincarnated uncle. In this he's unwittingly used like Jean Arthur's articles to bring Gary Cooper down by some unscrupulous relatives of Moore and Witty when Witty passes away.
If you've seen Mr. Deeds Goes To Town and Broadway Bill you know exactly where this whole story is going and how it will end.
The Return Of October does not come anywhere near being the classic that either of those films does. It still is an enjoyable fantasy with a lot of very good players penciled into parts that fit them well. I'm only sorry the story called for James Gleason to die so soon because he's always fun.
One of the great Hollywood stories that Frank Capra told was how Harry Cohn had stuck Capra's name on another film from Columbia to boost it in overseas markets. This caused Capra to leave Columbia when his contract was up, but the real upshot of that story was that Cohn would not even see that he did anything wrong.
Bearing that in mind it certainly is easy to see how Cohn could take two Capra classics and rework them and not give Capra nor two distinguished authors any credit at all.
The film was shot at Santa Anita racetrack with some establishing shots of Churchill Downs for the climax.
The Return Of October is no classic, but a pleasant piece of entertainment in any event.
Well-worth watching
tarpoff21 April 2008
I have nothing against the other reviews, but they do not seem to convey the message that this movie is well-worth watching. Almost anything Glenn Ford was in was worth watching and for that reason I watched this one morning and was thoroughly delighted. The pace of the movie is quite lively and the various actors all competent in their various roles. The direction and editing were also good and to get all that in a movie spells just what you want in a film - entertainment! There are a substantial number of humorous moments, lines and scenes. The viewer gets drawn into the events just as do the cast which is their role in the movie. I have seen almost all of the films starring Glenn Ford and this is not a typical "Glenn Ford" movie and was not on any "must see" list of mine. Although he performed admirably, any number of people could have played his role. The value of this movie is in its production and enjoyability.
Odd, obscure, contrived - but still interesting
Gangsteroctopus2 October 2006
When I came across this video (on the old GoodTimes budget label) in a Half Price Books in Tacoma, WA, my initial shock came from the fact that the film was directed by none other than cult auteur Joseph H. Lewis (GUN CRAZY, THE BIG COMBO). The fact that it was shot in Technicolor and starred one of Columbia's two contract leading men (the other being William Holden) makes me assume that this must have been a prestige picture for the studio that year. In all honesty, it's not very good, with a contrived courtroom finale that recalls the previous year's MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET for all the wrong reasons. A brief synopsis of the relevant plot points: greedy relatives are trying to cover up the fact that they've squandered a dead aunt's fortune by getting niece Terry Moore declared insane, based on the fact that she thinks her horse is her reincarnated uncle (isn't it funny how in films of this period people can be declared insane on the flimsiest of premises? maybe not so funny, though, if you were Francis Farmer). Glenn Ford is a doctor of philosophy who is researching the relationships between animals and humans (whatever) and his boss at the university thinks that a paper he's writing about Terry's 'delusion' will be a big seller and bring in lots of publicity and money for their foundering school (yeah, maybe in the Bizarro Universe). Terry Moore is cute but not a very good actress, over-emoting in her scenes with the horse to the point that you begin to think that, Yeah, this chick IS crazy. The late, great Glenn Ford is, as always, charming and essentially decent, though he hasn't at this point fully developed the comedic skills that would serve him much better in the '60s. There are some trademark Joseph H. Lewis shots here and there (early in the film there's a view of Terry and her uncle up in a stand observing a horse on a track shot from a ground level POV, framed by a white wooden railing; a lengthy automobile conversation between Moore and Ford recalls, if vaguely, similar scenes in GUN CRAZY between Peggy Cummins and John Dall), but is of interest on a stylistic level only for completists of the director's work. Still, that trained cat is pretty amazing (though it does look slightly narcotized in some of its scenes).
An uncle's a horse of course of course...
mark.waltz10 November 2020
Warning: Spoilers
What could have been a decent fantasy comedy starts off on a crooked angle thanks to the obnoxious heroine Terry Moore whose cutting in line in front of Glenn Ford leads to him being accused of pickpocketing her. Her passive-aggressive character doesn't warrant any sympathy from that moment on. So what did they do? Watch the race together! Even then, she goes out of her way to be nasty to him, calling him names and still continuing to stalk him. It's then that she finds the $5 that she thought he stole, and the stage is set to try to are you guys something Jesus in her to root for her. The fact that he allows her to tag along when he leaves the racetrack likes him one of the most idiotic leading romantic heroes I've ever seen, and he ends up getting a ticket for her insisting that he dropped her off in a no-parking zone.
After spending the first few reels of the film abusing Glenn Ford, Moore gets what's coming to her after the death of her uncle James Gleason by going to live with her aging aunt Dame May Whitty whose good-for-nothing offspring are waiting for the old lady to die. Moore calms down long enough to become barely tolerable, determined to get horse October to run in the Kentucky Derby. But for some reason, she begins to believe that Uncle Gleason has taken over the horse's personality, and this ends up with more on trial with the court judging her sanity as one of the heirs to Whitty's estate. This reunite her with Ford who was the psychiatrist and finds himself involved in the case.
You wonder why Glenn Ford accepted such an assignment other than contractual obligation from Columbia. The fantasy is promising but Moore's character is one of those young women so badly written that most people not only men would try to get as far away from her as possible. Characters like her are fine if they are minor in the plot (as comic relief), but she's the lead and you're supposed to like her. Even Margaret O'Brien in her most obnoxious scenes in ml"Meet Me in St. Louis" was more endearing than her. The color photography is pretty, but the magical moments that I was hoping for to make me really engaged in it never happened.
After spending the first few reels of the film abusing Glenn Ford, Moore gets what's coming to her after the death of her uncle James Gleason by going to live with her aging aunt Dame May Whitty whose good-for-nothing offspring are waiting for the old lady to die. Moore calms down long enough to become barely tolerable, determined to get horse October to run in the Kentucky Derby. But for some reason, she begins to believe that Uncle Gleason has taken over the horse's personality, and this ends up with more on trial with the court judging her sanity as one of the heirs to Whitty's estate. This reunite her with Ford who was the psychiatrist and finds himself involved in the case.
You wonder why Glenn Ford accepted such an assignment other than contractual obligation from Columbia. The fantasy is promising but Moore's character is one of those young women so badly written that most people not only men would try to get as far away from her as possible. Characters like her are fine if they are minor in the plot (as comic relief), but she's the lead and you're supposed to like her. Even Margaret O'Brien in her most obnoxious scenes in ml"Meet Me in St. Louis" was more endearing than her. The color photography is pretty, but the magical moments that I was hoping for to make me really engaged in it never happened.
First movie using real jockeys
bedlam622 July 2012
I think it is interesting to know, and most people don't, but this was the first movie using real jockeys in the horse-racing scenes. My father was one of those jockeys, James Cassity. I have never seen this movie. If anyone knows how I can get a DVD of this I would greatly appreciate it. A lot of the horse-racing movies from this era were campy and by todays standards, the acting is probably quite lacking, especially because a lot of the information about the racetrack was not accurate; this is one of the reasons that I would love to be able to see this movie. Not only because my father was in it, but to see just how accurate they were in portraying the the racetrack portions of it.
See also
Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews
