Half Shot at Sunrise

Always say "Dorothy Lee" in the same breath as "Wheeler and Woolsey". Here our favorite pert, loose-limbed ingénue has a grand time singing and dancing and trading quips with the two comedians who are on the loose in Paris in 1918. The script by Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle, Ralph ("Five Dollars-A-Word") Spence, James Ashmore Creelman (who will always be remembered for King Kong) and the famous Broadway librettist Anne Caldwell represents a deliciously zany parade of visual and verbal nonsense which the performers endeavor to keep moving at an admirably fast pace despite the well-meaning efforts of stodgy director Paul Sloane to slow it down. A special pat on the back (if "back" is the right word) for Leni Stengel who makes quite an impression in a whole crowd of lovely Parisians. Production values are remarkably extensive. RKO were obviously expecting to clean up on this one.