User reviews

Everyone should watch this film, not because it is funny (it isn't), but as a guide to show you what lengths studios & stars will go to cover up a stars physical flaw.

Whenever Bob Hope is on screen not wearing a hat, there is an annoying shadow on top of his head. At first I thought this was just a case of a bad director shooting the shadow of a boom mike, but as this is present throughout the whole film, and the shadow is only on Hope's head, I figured out that is was their way of hiding the fact that Bob Hope was balding. I was fascinated by this, so much in fact, that I eventually tuned out the movie (a pretty easy feat), and just starting watching the shadow on Bob Hope's head.

Wise-cracking widower Bob Hope (as Robert "Bob" Holcomb) arrives home to discover his pretty blonde daughter Tuesday Weld (as JoJo Holcomb) is engaged to pseudo-rock 'n' roll singer Frankie Avalon (as Kenny Klinger). Mr. Avalon has dropped put of college, rides a motorcycle, lives in a small trailer, and takes Ms. Weld out to strip clubs. Hope is horrified. In order to get Weld away from Avalon, he accepts a job transfer to Stockholm. There, Hope discovers a Swedish custom regarding pre-marital sex...

We are told, in order to determine how well they are "suited for each other," Swedes have sex before getting married. This insures a low divorce rate. Hope romances attractive Dina Merrill (as Karin Granstedt Martoni) and Weld prepares to lose her virginity during a two week vacation with playboy Jeremy Slate (as Erik Carlson). Hope declares, "Nobody's gonna chalk up any mileage on JoJo without getting a driver's license first!" To make Weld change her mind, Hope contacts Avalon in America...

Avalon returns to the storyline and gives the film a final burst of energy. The highlight is his performance of "I'll Take Sweden, Ya Ya Ya!" In brief blue swim trunks, Avalon gyrates around a boatyard, attracting Rosemarie Frankland in a white bikini. The beauty queen with obvious assets moved from Hope (one of the comedian's many alleged companions) to Grass Roots singer Warren Entner. Avalon was no longer selling rock 'n' roll records, but he is funnier and more appealing than all others, herein.

****** I'll Take Sweden (6/2/65) Frederick de Cordova ~ Bob Hope, Frankie Avalon, Tuesday Weld, Dina Merrill

This film is in the style of Doris Day films that feature compromising sexual situations and innuendo while on the surface everything remains innocent fun. That may have been titillating in 1965 when you couldn't say the word "pregnant" on TV and Rob and Laura Petrie had separate beds, but now it's just boring and adolescent. I get tired of this innuendo quickly, but it's always fun explaining each joke to my wife, because the entire thing goes way over her head.

This film features blatant sexual material centering around the question of Bob Hope's daughter: will she or won't she?

The film presents Sweden as a sexually free place, while America stands for a higher morality. On the surface the movie preaches this higher morality while actually presenting and capitalizing on the intriguing images and ideas of a free-lovin' society.

One problem with this type of film is that the writers think that the innuendo will carry the film. They think that just the fact that they are covertly, or in this case, overtly, talking about sex will keep us nervously giggling and entertained, gasping in shock or winking at each other. It's like a comedian whose act relies on dirty language. Ok, they may get nervous laughs, but after some time it gets boring or even distasteful. In this film, because the writers are overconfident, they don't bother with good characters, a good plot, clever dialog, motivations, or any thing else that makes for good drama or comedy, they just let the subject of sex carry it. That just doesn't cut it, especially not in modern times when any shock value it might have had is completely gone.

As far as comedies that deal with young people's attitudes towards sex go; "I'll Take Sweden", dumb as it may be, has loads more charm than the largely gross comedies that are dished up to audiences today.

Bob Hope, (with badly died dark hair) ever the professional, copes well with the sometimes unfunny lines given to him. There's super elegant Dina Merrill; Frankie Avalon brimming with youthful ebullience and Tuesday Weld, simultaneously demure and sexy, as always.

Despite the often ridiculous depiction of the social mores of the time, somehow the movie remains immensely watchable largely because of the cast, who all had careers of some interest. From this fun but undoubted mediocrity, Hope's movies went downhill steadily and embarrassingly. Merrill went into television with unspectacular results. Avalon didn't quite survive the beach movies which made him so popular at the time. Weld had the good sense to break the mold into which the system had cast her, moving on to many fine performances, if not quite becoming the star that at the time would have seemed she was destined to become.

For those interested in the actors involved, there's something to enjoy in this innocuous yet not obnoxious 95 minutes.

In an effort to keep daughter Tuesday Weld away from bad boy Frankie Avalon, Bob Hope takes a job in Sweden. This is just another of the egregiously unfunny movies Hope was making in the 1960s. The film has one distinguishing feature: it manages to cast Weld and make her completely unappealing! Surprisingly cast to begin with, Weld has little to do but roll her eyes or wince at Hope's unfunny wisecracks. Perhaps Annette Funicello or Deborah Walley would have been a better choice for Weld's role. She's far too intelligent to have us believe she'd be smitten with the empty headed Avalon. The presence of classy Dina Merrill, as Hope's love interest, is a plus even if her Swedish accent is a bit half-hearted. Directed, in the style of the average 60s sitcom, by the undistinguished Fred DeCordova.

After weeks ago taping this and the one that preceded it-Kings Go Forth-on DVR off the THIS movie channel, I finally decided to watch Bob Hope's I'll Take Sweden. Unfortunately, while the previous picture's enjoyment was marred a little bit by having the scenes freeze and then fade out constantly while the audio was still running during the ending scenes, so it was with this one during the beginning ones. Still, once that was fixed, I did find this one quite amusing if not completely hilarious despite, or maybe because of, the silly contrivances that permeated the whole screenplay written by Nat Perrin, Robert Fisher, and Arthur Marx, the latter of which happens to be the son of the one and only Groucho. I mean, Mr. Hope still has a way with a punchline and Frankie Avalon provides some energy with his slacker role with enjoyable, if a little forgettable, music interludes. Dina Merril is appealing enough as Bob's paramour and Tuesday Weld provides her own charms as his stunning daughter. Then there's Jeremy Slate as the Swedish rival with Avalon for Ms. Weld's attentions. While he and Ms. Merril are close to overdoing the Scandinavian accent, his is almost close to irritating. Good thing it all turns out the way it does. But all in all, with competent direction from Frederick De Cordova, I rather enjoyed I'll Take Sweden.

JOJO(Weld): Daddy, I think I found Mister right! BOB HOLCOLM (HOPE): OH, I KNOW A BILL WRIGHT!

And so begins the first salvo fired in this joyously painful assault on a genre that was stale long before this was dumped on hundreds of deserted theaters-the generation gap comedy. Acres of atrocious puns and one-liners battle the parameters of entertainment decency---yet who can resist? Take an aging Frankie Avalon, a budding star in Weld appearing in her last thankless role until "Cincinnati Kid"saved her, aryan legend Jeremy Slate and producer Edward Small's cardboard studio backdrops substituting for Scandinavia, mix with Johnny Carson's longtime producer/director and you have the beginning of Hope's career slide that didn't hit rock bottom until "Cancel my Reservation" was unleashed 7 years hence. It's been 30 years since his last starring role and the scary thing is, the entire cast of all of his yearly cinematic holocausts from 65-72 are still alive and could reunite for Boy, Did I Get A Wrong Number 2 (the late, great Cesare Danova not withstanding). Suffice to say Hope was always only as good as his writers. The impossibly guileless challenge of his obnoxiously un-hip, sexist attitude and the wardrobe straight from Squaresville will amuse only the few Hope cultists who find the sheer bombastic gall and idiocy riotous (guilty!)--- and the ultimate irony--- touching. Younger audiences catching this on the tube without warning are bound to be indifferent-the coup de gras for longevity (the ancient comic trying to prove his lasting power to the few loyal surviving fans) and unlike the timeless masters- e.g. Buster Keaton, Fields, etc. there will undoubtedly not be a re-discovery of Hope's excellent early work as the residue of the crap of the last 40 years is too thick to peel away. I'll Take Sweden" is his best film since 1965. For those who thought this a temporary mis-step in Hope's career----a helmet-headed Marjorie Lord waited anxiously in the wings.........

"Bob Holcomb" (Bob Hope) is an oil company executive who comes home and finds out that his teenage daughter "JoJo" (Tuesday Weld) is throwing a party with all of her friends and essentially wrecking the house in the process. If that wasn't bad enough she tells him that she has fallen in love and introduces him to a young man by the name of "Kenny Klinger" (Frankie Avalon) who she wants to marry. Bob realizes at once that Kenny is a bit too wild and immature for his daughter so in order to create some distance between the two of them he decides to accept an assignment to Sweden and take her with him. But things don't work out exactly as he plans because once there she finds a Swedish boyfriend named "Erik Carlson" (Jeremy Slate) who is much more sexually sophisticated and aggressive than Kenny ever was. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this film shares a similarity to the "beach movies" produced in the early 60's which typically evolved around young men and women dancing to rock-and-roll music and getting romantically acquainted while having to overcome a host of weird obstacles along the way. This film is no exception and carries with it the same light humor and dated quality. True to form, Bob Hope throws some good one-liners here and there which certainly helps a comedy of this type. Likewise, the presence of an attractive actress like Tuesday Weld doesn't hurt this film in anyway either. Even so, neither of them could offset the uneven production quality or the rather predictable plot and because of that I have rated this movie accordingly. Average.

I watched this movie principally for the fashions and interior details. Bob Hope with his 1940's brylcreamed dyed-too-dark-hair was embarrassing. Frankie 'yeah man' Avalon had missed the bus majorly. Fall-flat slapstick jokes unable to be carried off by the lead - and why should he bother. Dialogue and plot gossamer thin. Dina Merrill was exquisite - a beautiful elegant society matron, a clothes horse, a mannequin with the sweetest smile. Tuesday Weld reminded me a little bit of Julie from the Love Boat during her 'later' phase. I'm just adding words now so I can submit this review....

Overall: execrable.

In rattling off one lame joke after another, persevering like a stevedore in the face of his time slipping away, cocky crooked grin intact, Hope approaches depths of surrealism that should've impressed Bunuel. When he tells Dina Merrill that he's never met an interior decorator with her exterior, and she reacts with a dewy smile, it's like cutting the eyeball in Un Chien Andalou. Meanwhile Frankie Avalon struts around like he's the Tom Cruise of his generation. Check out Frankie's astonishing, hip-gyrating 'I'll Take Sweden Ya Ya Ya' number and you'll swear someone slipped mescaline into your coffee. This is one of the all time great camp classics, awaiting its proper appreciation.

This is pretty terrible, but there are a few good moments. For example, Bob Hope is talking to his boss and says. "I didn't sleep last night." His boss replies, "You should talk to my doctor, he can't sleep either." That was the highlight for me.

You have to love Bob Hope's singular ability to be behind the times in terms of getting young teen idols to give his films a little youthful appeal. Two years after the British invasion where the music scene would irrevocably be changed, Hope casts Frankie Avalon and Tuesday Weld in I'll Take Sweden considerably after their time as teen idols had come and gone.

In fact the film never got closer to Sweden than Big Bear Lake and Lake Arrowhead the two California locations chosen to represent the pretty parts of Scandinavia. Which is a real pity because Stockholm is known as the Paris of the north and has reputation as a beautiful city. I wonder why producer Edward Small and Hope played on the cheap and didn't bother to go to Sweden to film this picture.

Hope's in a role James Stewart played better in Take Her She's Mine as the harassed father of a shapely teenage girl. In case you're wondering, Tuesday Weld is the shapely teenage girl. Hope disapproves of boyfriend Frankie Avalon whom he thinks of as a beach bum dead head, living in a trailer at the beach and no prospects for a job. He decides on impulse to take a job in Sweden with his company and relocate.

It starts to work out real well and Weld's found herself a nice Swedish boy in Jeremy Slate. Widower Hope's not doing too bad either with Dina Merrill. But when Hope finds out about the Scandinavian sexual attitudes, this red state American is saying 'not with my daughter, you Viking Casanova'.

I'd have rated this film higher had we actually seen a bit of Sweden here. But for all this it just turns into a typical bedroom comedy as Hope and Merrill find out that Slate and Weld have registered in the same hotel for the same reason and Hope goes tearing around the place looking to save Weld from a fate worse than death. Oh, and he's brought Frankie Avalon over from California to help finding new virtues in him he hadn't seen before.

You know what the dumbest thing in the film was. The fact that a no tell hotel in Sweden people register there as Mr.&Mrs. John Smith for anonymity. You'd think they'd register with the Swedish equivalent of same in Sweden.

For a Hope fan like me, the flick was a disappointment. Don't look for his comically flustered style til the last part, when he runs amusingly through the many stranger-filled hotel bedrooms -- and just what is it those bedroom couples are doing? It's then that the movie really gels.

That's not to overlook the opening scene where gyrating teens of the mid-1960's could light up a city, while Hope's strait-laced father looks on disapprovingly. So how's he going to keep daughter Weld from marrying into Avalon's reckless crew. By moving to sophisticated Sweden, of course. Trouble is, as Dad finds out, Sweden's even looser sexually than back in the good old USA. Good thing Sweden's Dina Merrill is there to help ease his protective tension. But what about the stiffly handsome Slate whose got his Swedish eye on Weld. So what's Dad to do.

Basically the movie's about sexual innuendo at a time when American mores were changing from the conformist 1950's. (A couple more years and the free-wheeling Hippie movement would appear.) So in that cultural sense the movie appears unfortunately dated with its cutting-edge emphasis of the time. I'm surmising, but I suspect Hope was hoping to connect with the younger generation, given the flick's key aspects. Too bad his brand of delightful humor wasn't better served.

Anyway, for Hope fans, hang on til the last part when the tempo picks up. In the meantime, there's cutie Weld to entertain the eyes of hormonal guys like me.

This is typical Bob Hope mindles slock for teen date night movies in the mid 60's. Pros and Cons.

Pros: 1. Tuesday Weld is worth seeing.

2. Some limited historical value. Some of the vintage cars are primo and nice to see.

3. Color filming is decent.

4. Some mindless and harmless viewing.

5. It was on Amazon Prime so I didn't have to pay anymore to watch it.

Cons: 1. They didn't film any of it in Sweden! Holy crap that would have jacked up my historical value part of my assessment. So most of the movie is on studio sets, woopie for a cheap movie.

2. Bob Hope. I've grown to not be really into ole Bob unless the movie is actually good.

3. Its mindless slock to keep the mindless entertained. Its a yin and yang on this one.

4. Lord they didn't even provide one shot of Sweden! Jeez that is cheap cheap cheap!!! WOW.

Tuesday Weld plays Bob Hope's virginal teenage daughter, but she looks a little seasoned for the part. She's seriously hung up on high school dropout Frankie Avalon, so Hope takes advantage of an open position within his company to move to Sweden, where Weld temporarily forgets Avalon after meeting cultured Jeremy Slate, who is really a Swedish playboy. Flatly-directed comedy with a few funny lines finally buried under a desperate final reel which has Hope busting into various hotel rooms, trying to stop his daughter from doing the deed. Sex comedy without sex, but with a lot of dancing around the subject. Glossy and silly (and clearly filmed entirely in California), the picture would actually be somewhat forgivable if only screenwriter Nat Perrin had provided Hope with some witty repartee. Instead, Perrin and director Frederick De Cordova concentrate on situational farce--burlesque routines--while the supporting cast goes down with the ship. ** from ****

"I'll Take Sweden" is supposed to be set in Sweden, though it wasn't filmed there and almost none of the actors are Swedes. And, when they supposedly show Bob Hope and others in Sweden, they use cheap looking rear projection to superimpose themselves into the shots. They also show some of the Swedes as sex maniacs. All this lead me to wonder what Swedish people thought about this film!

When the story starts, Bob Holcolm (Bob Hope) is worried because his daughter, Jojo (Tuesday Weld) is smitten with a guy who seems immature and a bit goofy (Frankie Avalon). So, to break up this relationship, Bob takes a transfer with his company and now they both are in Sweden. Unfortunately, Jojo soon falls for Erik, a real womanizer.

"I'll Take Sweden" seems to be a film where Bob Hope is trying desperately to appeal to younger viewers...a group who traditionally were not Hope fans. I am not sure how they received this, but when I see it today I can't help but think that the basic plot is clever but the writing is lazy. In other words, Hope essentially talks and acts like Bob Hope doing a monologue*. Instead of sounding like a concerned father, he comes off as a bit phony....as NO ONE in real life talks like he did in this and many of his later films. Now I am NOT saying it's a bad film but it missed the mark and really could have been so much better. Filming it IN Sweden, having Hope act more human and infusing the film with a few jokes could have gone a long way to make this better.

*After watching the film, I read the review by vincentlynch-moonoi and they really summed it up well when they said "No Bob...this is a movie, not a t.v. Skit where all you need to do is rely on one liners".

Good Screwball comedy movie that is a definite B-Quality production but still is good enough to tickle the funny bones of those who like the genre and Bob Hope. The performance of Tuesday Weld was very memorable as she proves she has comedy skills as well. Very good Color.......

Exactly the sort of lightweight silliness you'd expect.

The primary interesting point is a comparison with say the equivalent 50s movie. In the 50s both the adults and the kids would be subject to the same moral code; in this movie we get the adults (who, let's not forget have both been married) kinda sorta going down a different path from what they insist for the kids, but feeling guilty about it.

Obviously in both cases this is all show, we know from plenty of war memoirs exactly what happened in WW2 (and who can blame them, both the guys expecting to die at any moment, and the girls fully aware of how serious the stakes were and doing whatever they could to help those guys out). But that's followed by the end of war and an awful lot of divorces or persisting, but unhappy, marriages.

So I guess we have the 50s as a desperate attempt to, not exactly impose normality, but more inform people "look we've lived through the extreme passions, we know how it goes, and the consequences are long even as the honeymoon is short". What happens in the 60s? Well Griswold is 1965. But that's only for married couples. Looks to me like we have a combination of

• the war (and all its consequences in terms of mad passion, unwed pregnancies, and early marriages) is 20 years ago and the memories less fresh
• contraception is clearly going to be commonplace even if it isn't so yet

So we have movies like this at the cusp, still insisting on the morality of pre-1965, but very clearly aware that the post-1965 world is coming.

And of course the adorable idea that "Swedish girls are easy" which is basically the perpetual dream of the teenage male that, certainly not where he lives, but perhaps somewhere, the girls are easy. If you live in New York, maybe this is the case in California (The Sure Thing). If you live in England maybe it's the case in Greece (The Inbetweeners Movie). And so it goes.

I haven't been able to watch more than a couple of minutes of this gem, but I will for one reason and one reason alone. Mr. Joel Coen (or was it Ethan), from such hits as Crimewave (writer, 1985) and The Evil Dead (assistant editor, 1983), said he (they) liked it. That's all it takes for me to look at a film with a new perspective and appreciation. I would highly recommend you do the same. Also, I heard Mr. Jiminy Glick reference the film when Conan was his guest. I like that. That suits me just fine. I wouldn't watch a film only because Jiminy drops the name, but it certainly doesn't hurt the cause. And one last note, do yourself a favor and watch Mr. Preston Sturges' tale of a wanderer, harried for days on end, entitled "Sullivan's Travels" (1941). You shall find both everlasting salvation and unending ecstasy.

Not one of Bob's Best but well worth watching James Welch Henderson, Arkansas 3/2/2021