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. ***.

UP IN MABEL'S ROOM

Mischa Auer, Dennis O'Keefe and baby

UP IN MABEL'S ROOM (1944). Director: Allan Dwan.

Gary (Dennis O'Keefe) is married to the easily excitable and almost neurotically jealous Geraldine (Marjorie Reynolds). Years ago Gary had a drunken fling in Mexico City with Mabel (Gail Patrick), and gave her some intimate lingerie with a love message embroidered on it with his name. Mabel, who is engaged to Gary's prospective business partner, Arthur (Lee Bowman), thinks Gary should be honest about it and they can all laugh about it and forget it -- very sensible -- but not-so-sensible, nervous Gary wants to get the notorious slip out of Mabel's hands and destroy it. To that end he hires Boris (Mischa Auer) to help him get it when the two couples and others converge at a house party. Somehow, after much hiding under beds and marital misunderstandings, the rumor gets around that Gary and Mabel's big secret isn't a mere slip, but a "slip" of a baby! Up in Mabel's Room is based on a creaky old farce that might have been hilarious in its day, but this attempt to turn it into a wartime screwball comedy just doesn't come off. There are some talented players in this -- O'Keefe certainly tries hard, Patrick is quite likable as the sophisticated Mabel, and Mischa Auer gets the film's only laughs (and there are far too few of them) -- but Marjorie Reynolds [Bring On the Girls] and most of the others show no gift for farce. If the picture were really funny you might overlook that most of the characters are quite stupid. John Hubbard [The Mummy's Tomb] and Binnie Barnes play another couple, and Charlotte Greenwood is an older woman who thinks Boris is a burglar and tries to shoot him. Allan Dwan also directed the terrible Brewster's Millions with O'Keefe.

Verdict: Pick any Mexican Spitfire movie and it will be a lot funnier -- this is leaden. *1/2