Miss Tatlock's Millions

Screwball comedy that loses its steam and becomes a strange love story. The early scenes with Monty Dooley are the best. After that the witty dialogue and slapstick taper off.

It us still a pleasant watch.

This movie I saw on the late show when I was a boy. It was quite late and I snuck into the living room and joined my father to watch TV. How ever I was laughing so hard at this movie it woke my mother, who thought I was in bed. So I missed the ending. I still remember it and that has been almost 40 years. The dialog was fast and funny anchored on an unusual plot. I only wish that It was available now so I could see how it ended.

I'm told that when "Miss Tatlock's Millions" came out in 1948, it was a medium-size hit that had a small but extremely loyal cult following (sort of like the original "Bedazzled" in 1967). It's too bad that it's now almost completely forgotten -- a result of having never come out on video (except for a poor-quality bootleg dupe), a fate it shares with many late '40s Paramounts -- "The Great Gatsby," "The Big Clock," "Alias Nick Beal," and others. Like them, "Miss Tatlock's Millions" was long a staple of late-show TV but has now seemingly dropped off the face of the earth.

"Miss Tatlock's Millions" is, not to mince words, a riot. Another commenter here compares it to Preston Sturges, something that had never occurred to me before but which is very apt. It has the same kind of screwball pacing, distinctive characters, and brilliant dialogue (of course, Sturges remains peerless, but this one is in the same tradition and a very respectable specimen).

John Lund is wonderful as the fake "Skylar" and it's a pity he didn't get more challenges like this. I think he was a victim of his own good looks; the gang at Paramount decided he was a wooden pretty-boy, so that's all they gave him to do. But he sure delivers the goods here.

And the rest of the cast! Monty Woolley, Ilka Chase, Robert Stack, Barry Fitzgerald, Dan Tobin, Dorothy Stickney. That bunch would be fun to watch in anything, but give them Charles Brackett's dialogue and the combination is unbeatable. (The film, by the way, has at least one line that was, for a while anyhow, quite famous and oft-quoted by people who had no idea where it came from. Spoken by Monty Woolley: "I hate California. It's the only place on earth where you can fall asleep under a rosebush in full bloom and freeze to death.")

As the comments here attest, there is no one who's seen "Miss Tatlock's Millions" who doesn't love it and remember it as one of the funniest movies they ever saw. The only reason it's not up there with the great comedies -- the only reason, for example, that it placed nowhere on AFI's list of the (supposed) 100 greatest comedies -- is that not enough people have seen it.

Bring it back!

Most people who have actually seen this movie seem to love it, and comment on its humor. Certainly it is a top drawer comedy, but I first saw it as a teenager and fell in love with Wanda Hendrix immediately. She is gorgeous, and has a speech pattern that borders on a little lisp, and it gives her a combination of innocence and appeal that is hard to beat. You easily learn to hate the bad guy who is out to get her, and the development of the romance is delightful. And, of course, any time Barry Fitzgerald is on camera, he steals the scene. Ilke Chase and Monte Wooley are marvelous in character parts. Robert Stack does a great job as the wolf you love to hate. When Wanda Hendrix is tracing letters with her finger on Art Lund's chest, you have to be a very unusual person not to feel your temperature rise a little. I agree with the reviewer who can't understand why this gem has not been published on DVD. I'd stand in line to get it.

In 1948, I saw this movie with friends, not expecting much. I went in not knowing much about the actors and came out howling with glee at the sparkling writing, crisp direction, romantic story and most of all the peerless company of scene-stealing character actors. Now, I was very young at the time so I probably couldn't have told you then exactly why I would never forget it until I became a film buff years later.

Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a decent video available. I recently bought one at Amazon and it is of the same poor, frustrating quality as the one that occasionally pops up on late night TV.

This is the gem that got away and deserves to be recognized. Anyone know someone with clout at AMC??