by Adam Ritchie, Contributing Writer
Well I guess it’s that time of month already: another 20th Century Flicks. So time for another spelunk into the caverns of cinema history. This month, I want to tell you all about a little nugget of gold I found.
Let’s travel all the way back to 1938, before World War II (worst sequel ever!) and let me talk to you about the Howard Hawks directed rom-com classic, Bringing Up Baby. This movie stars two literal silver screen legends in a (relatively younger) Cary Grant and the spritely Katherine Hepburn.
Grant plays a bumbling paleontologist David Huxley, who is trying to secure a one million dollar donation that will aid him in completing his dinosaur exhibit. He receives news that the last bone he has been waiting four years for is finally on its way to complete his exhibition, and with his wedding quickly approaching, it is fair to say that is facing a bit of pressure from his personal and professional life.
On the day before his wedding, David is trying to schmooze his way to the donation on the golf course with the lawyer of the potential benefactor, Elizabeth Ransom (May Robson). After hooking one onto the next fairway, David finds his ball being played by a lady who refuses to hear him out. Introducing herself as Susan Vance (Hepburn), she continues to find ways to frustrate David by driving off in his car as it looks similar to hers, and is coincidentally parked next to it. This gag would not pass today, but it is handled so well, that by this point, I think I was as equally frustrated as David, with Susan continually talking over his protestations.
Minor spoilers ahead if you know nothing about the film.
Thinking David is a zoologist, she manages to manipulate him to come to her place to help her with a tamed leopard named Baby! You didn’t think Baby was an actual baby, did you? Well, full disclosure, I did, but I was pleasantly surprised that Baby was not, in fact, a baby, because it is key in making this movie the absolute delight that it is. Baby has been sent from Susan’s brother Mark in South America as gift for their aunt.
Having his long-awaited dinosaur bone delivered and traipsing Baby up to the country estate with Susan, circumstance lead David in need of a shower and a fresh change of clothes. Whilst in the shower, the bone is haphazardly lost when Susan’s aunt’s dog George runs off with it to bury it on the property. Meanwhile, Susan has fallen in love with David, and hides his clothes in an attempt to keep in around for as long as she possibly can.
With no option but to wear whatever he can find, David finds himself in a nightgown and meeting Susan’s aunt, who turns out to be the benefactor of the million dollars he has been pursuing. With a ‘friend’ Major Horace Applegate (Charles Ruggles), a well-seasoned big game hunter, accompanying her, much of the film’s hilarity ensues as Baby escapes it’s enclosure, and David and Susan spend most of their time either trying to find Baby, or chasing George around the estate waiting for him to unearth the buried dinosaur bone.
Faced with seemingly ridiculous odds whilst on the search for Baby, David and Susan stumble across an abandoned vehicle containing a caged leopard they believe to be Baby, letting it out of its cage, as unknowingly this leopard is a different un-tamed leopard from a nearby zoo. Needless to say, much more hijinks ensue, and the end result is not going to surprise you. However, the journey there is so much fun. Hepburn might be playing the first ever manic pixie dream girl. She’s a flighty and free-spirited type of character you would expect to come from the ‘right side of the tracks’ in the ’30s.
Grant begins off shaky, but comes into his own as the bumbling nerd type, something I’ve not seen him play before, as in his golden years, he was always the suave and sophisticated guy everyone wanted to be. Some of the fringe roles are also great. I especially loved Ruggles as Major Applegate; his line delivery had me in stitches most of the time.
So, to the crux of it all. I haven’t laughed so hard at a movie for a very long time. I was in hysterics for most of the film, and actually thought I was going to pass out twice; this is no lie. However, it may have caught me on a good day, or it might simply be that it delivered me something completely unexpected as I knew absolutely zero about this before I hit ‘Play.’
I will add that it feels strange to me that I don’t recognize a lot of the jokes and situations from an 85-year-old movie. I’m sure I’ve seen the tropes repeated over the years, but there was just something so comforting and unique about this that hit me at the right time and the right place.
I absolutely loved it.
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