DANGEROUS WHEN WET

Fernando Lamas and Esther Williams

DANGEROUS WHEN WET (1953). Director: Charles Walters.

Katie Higgins (Esther Williams) belongs to a very healthy Arkansas family whose farm needs a lot of improvement. Along comes Windy Weebe (Jack Carson), who hawks a dubious product known as Liquipep. Katie is able to resist Windy's all-too-obvious advances, but she decides to let Liquipep sponsor her whole family in a race to swim the English Channel. While getting in training both in England and France, Katie meets a wealthy French playboy named Andre (Fernando Lamas of The Lost World), but his pursuit of her may endanger her chances of winning the race. Dangerous When Wet is a very entertaining and amiable pic with a funny script by Dorothy Kingsley and very good performances from Williams and the rest of the cast, which includes William Demarest and Charlotte Greenwood [Up in Mabel's Room] as Katie's parents; Denise Darcel as the very buxom French entry Gigi; and Barbara Whiting [Fresh from Paris] as Katie's younger sister, Suzie, who warbles "I Like Men." The bouncy, pleasant score is by Arthur Schwartz and Johnny Mercer, and also includes "I Got Outa Bed," "My Wildest Dreams;" and "Ain't Nature Great." Williams doesn't have a bad voice, and while Lamas can carry a tune, his tones are not exactly dulcet. The film has two major highlights: Charlotte Greenwood going into her dance with such obvious joy and kicking up her heels like she's double-jointed; and the suspenseful climax when Katie desperately tries to make it across the twenty miles of the channel, which is filmed in harrowing detail. Another bright moment is a sequence when Williams has a dream of being underwater with the cartoon characters Tom and Jerry, as well as a grabby octopus that is meant to represent Lamas. When the Higgins family first gets to England, the business with all of the fog is funny but causes eye strain after awhile.Williams married Lamas sixteen years after this film was made and they remained together until his death.

Verdict: Possibly Williams' best picture, and an unqualified delight. ***.

FRESH FROM PARIS

FRESH FROM PARIS (aka Paris Follies of 1956/1955). Director: Leslie Goodwins.

"If I thought there was any other woman, I'd leave you and the show as flat as yesterday's pancakes."

Dan Bradley (Forrest Tucker) has high hopes for his new supper club, Moulin Rouge in Hollywood, but he has two major problems: First, his lead singer, Margaret (Margaret Whiting) is threatening to walk out if she catches him with another woman and he's just proposed to his lady love, Ruth (Martha Hyer); Second, the fellow who is backing the club (Lloyd Corrigan) is not a wealthy entrepreneur but a loony with no money. Filmed at the actual Moulin Rouge nightclub this film hasn't much plot but it manages to be entertaining in spite of it and has some pleasant song numbers. Tucker, who you wouldn't think would be a good fit for this type of material, is at his most amiable; Hyer is pretty and competent; and Whiting -- although certainly devoid of Hollywood-style beauty -- is a very good singer. Other acts include the Sportsmen and a talented tenor named Frank Parker. Perky Barbara Whiting, Margaret Whiting's sister, also plays her sister in this movie. [The sisters later co-starred on the summer replacement sitcom Those Whiting Girls.] Goodwins directed everything from The Mummy"s Curse to Mexican Spitfire at Sea, one of the best of that series.

Verdict: Not as much fun as Tucker's The Cosmic Monsters, but not terrible. **1/2.