THAT TOUCH OF MINK

Doris Day and Cary Grant

THAT TOUCH OF MINK (1962). Director: Delbert Mann.

"When a man donates $200,000, he's entitled to use the facilities."

Wealthy entrepreneur Philip Shayne (Cary Grant) is in his limousine when it splashes mud on out-of-work Cathy Timberlake (Doris Day.) Philip sends his associate, Roger (Gig Young of Hunt the Man Down) to apologize for him, but Cathy insists Philip do it himself. When she meets him, however, she is so instantly smitten that she apologizes to him. Thus begins a difficult romance in which Cathy does her best to maintain her virtue even as Philip flies her off to exotic places and wines and dines her par excellance. A series of comical misunderstandings may or may not lead to the altar ...

A date from Hell: Doris Day and John Astin

That Touch of Mink is a funny movie, greatly abetted by the performances of the two leads. One could quibble that both of them, especially Grant, are a bit too old to be dancing around this whole sex-or-no-sex business, but they make the skirmishes amusing in spite of it. John Astin is also notable as a sleazy man in the unemployment office who has a hankering for Cathy and winds up wishing that he didn't.

Although there's nothing necessarily wrong with Audrey Meadows' performance, I was somehow disappointed by it. Meadows certainly knew how to slap down a line on The Honeymooners, but maybe this part should have been essayed by Eve Arden. Laurie Mitchell, the Queen of Outer Space herself, has a bit part as a showgirl, and John Fiedler is amusing as a confused bridegroom who gets the wrong idea about his wife. That Touch of Mink is typical of many sixties comedies in that it milks some humor out of a misunderstanding over a character's sexual orientation -- in this case Roger's shrink (Alan Hewitt, who is also very good) thinks he is gay. It does lead up to a silly but nevertheless hilarious final sequence.

Verdict: Despite its dated qualities (on so many levels), this is a consistently amusing picture with extremely adept leads. ***. 

HARPER VALLEY P.T.A.

The "Harper Valley hypocrites" on the PTA board

HARPER VALLEY P.T.A. (1978). Director: Richard Bennett.

Based on Jeannie C. Riley's amusing hit record, this details the struggles of widowed mother Stella Johnson (Barbara Eden of A Private's Affair) against the hypocrites of the Harper Valley PTA. As in the song, Stella - who's been called an unfit mother -- attends a meeting, calls out all the board members, exposes their sins and hypocrisy -- and that should have been enough. Instead Stella, who doesn't seem to be playing with a full deck, spends time, money and energy getting further revenge on everyone on the council, even importuning her friend Alice (Nanette Fabray), who owns a beauty parlor, to put acid in the hair of council president Flora Simpson Reilly (Audrey Christie). Of course Ms. Reilly's hair falls off in clumps until she's practically bald, at one of her chi chi parties. Sure, the woman was a snob, but talk about overkill! Since we never see the repercussions of these revenge schemes, one imagines that Alice was arrested for assault and received the papers for a million dollar civil suit off-screen [not to mention that hardly anyone would go to her beauty parlor after they heard what happened to Reilly!] True, movies like this are not supposed to be looked at too closely, but via her actions Stella seems to prove that she really isn't a fit mother! There's an amusing bit of business with Stella locking one board member out of a hotel room stark naked -- he finds a clever way to drape his body --  and the scene involving horse manure doesn't, er, stink, but most of the movie is simply strained and unfunny. Not one of the many actors in this betrays any great comedic skill aside from John Fiedler, who is very amusing as an aging and unlikely Casanova. This was a hit, and led into a pretty bad TV series of the same name. Audrey Christie made a better impression years before as the reporter Jane in Keeper of the Flame, her first film.

Verdict: At least it's a great song. **.