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. ***.

TARZAN AND THE SLAVE GIRL

Vanessa Brown and Lex Barker

TARZAN AND THE SLAVE GIRL (1950). Director: Lee Sholem.

When people start dropping from an unknown sickness, Tarzan (Lex Barker) leads an expedition headed by Dr. Campbell (Arthur Shields of Daughter of Dr. Jekyll) to find its origins. Meanwhile Jane (Vanessa Brown) and Campbell's nurse, a saucy lady named Lola (Denise Darcel) who is lustful for the ape man, wind up kidnapped with other women by the cult of the Lionians. The women are placed in a harem for their prince (Hurd Hatfield of The Picture of Dorian Gray), whose young son is also dying of the illness. Will Tarzan and party be able to rescue Jane and Lola, save the little boy, and keep everyone from being thrown to the lions? What do you think?  The Lionians camouflage themselves with foliage to sneak up on their enemies, and use blow guns with poisoned darts. As Jane, Vanessa Brown is cute and almost child-like; she has an amusing, if brief, cat fight with Lola over Tarzan. Denise Darcel is a little too plump in this and in some shots resembles a man in drag, although her performance is spirited. Tarzan and Jane rub noses like Eskimos, and the adorable Cheetah gets several good scenes, such as when he (or she?) gets drunk on hooch. Tarzan can put up with a lot of things, but he doesn't like it when Lola picks up a needle and tries to give him an injection. In a thankless role, Robert Alda [The Beast with Five Fingers] plays a colleague of Dr. Campbell's. This was Brown's only appearance as Jane.

Verdict: Kind of ho hum Tarzan adventure, even if Tarzan meets Dorian Gray -- sort of. **.