Cancel My Reservation

"Cancel My Reservation" is just what it wants to be. In other words, it's a very successful movie, even if it's just successful at being completely confusing and silly. Bob Hope fumbles through this movie looking old and confused (even this far back), and the dated sexual roles and racist overtones are just one more factor that makes the viewer wince. There is a cute sight gag or two, but the movie just seems like a drawn out Hope skit from a television special. Fans of Johnny Carson or John Wayne can catch short cameos that will bring a smile.

Bob Hope's swan song is pretty lame. Yet somehow, I feel this film is a compelling one to watch and I can't quite put my finger on it.

Hope had sharp wit and was somewhat subversive back in the 40's, but once he got rich he became an unbearable conservative - his shows for the troops nothwithstanding. As such, I think I really enjoyed watching him embarrass himself in this horrific bit of celluloid swill.

This has a lot in common with Preminger's "Skidoo" in that it really does try to be hip and modern without having a clue what that means. Director Bogart doesn't want to seem to move the camera anymore than he has to and so the flick has a very TV movie feel to it... not surprising since Bogart did a lot of TV work - most notably, "All In the Family". For a much better look at what he could do, watch "Mr. Ricco" with Dean Martin. Bogart did a good job in this one, released in 1975.

Bogart wastes what could be an interesting story by failing to utilize some really great southwestern scenery. I'm not sure who the cinematographer was, but they should be beaten, waterboarded and shot as soon as they can be located.

The storyline is very contrived and serves only to allow Hope to joke around and toss out some one-liners as a talk show host on vacation with his much-too-young wife played by the totally wasted here Eva Marie Saint. Toss in marital troubles, Native American preaching and a murder mystery and you've got a tremendous mess. This movie has a "make it up as you go" feel.

The only real reason to watch it is to be amazed at how bad it is, and to watch it unfold, like a train wreck in slow motion. It's like watching your rich, arrogant, drunk uncle soil himself on the dance floor at a wedding reception - and you like it because the old bastard is such a jerk.

I need some tummy tones. I'll stop now.

What a horrible little film--so many talented players wasted in a piece of ephemeral tripe! Bob Hope's gags consist mainly of long outdated topical references. He says, 'Johnny Carson' or 'Dick Cavett', and we are supposed to fall about laughing. Hope, by 1972, was far too old for this sort of role. It is a flop as a comedy, is in no sense a mystery, and mostly it is tedious in the extreme. If you see this film on your TV program, avoid it--it will disappoint you.

After Cancel My Reservation Bob Hope made no more films for the big screen. It's as if his career ran out of gas in the seventies. Of course with the reception this film got, it was no surprise he stuck to television and military base tours.

When I looked at Cancel My Reservation again for the purposes of writing this review I was dumbfounded to learn that it had been based on a Louis L'Amour western novel, The Broken Gun. Now nobody had ever accused Louis L'Amour of writing comedy, so I'd love to know how one of his gritty western tales became the basis for a Bob Hope film?

Hope plays a TV talk show host who's advised by his doctor to take a needed vacation away from his wife Eva Marie Saint. Seems as though she came on the show as a co-host, kind of like the way Joy Philbin occasionally fills in for Kelly Ripa with Regis and it's grating on his hammy nerves.

Wouldn't you know it but Rapid Robert gets himself involved with not one, not two, but three murders while in Arizona. Bodies just keep popping up around him. Eva Marie comes west to help him solve this, but Nick and Nora Charles, they're not. The only one who believes him is Anne Archer, the stepdaughter of wealthy rancher Ralph Bellamy.

Cancel My Reservation marks the final appearance of Bing Crosby in an unbilled cameo in a Bob Hope film. That was a regular occurrence in the forties and fifties. The sequence is an imaginary one after sheriff Keenan Wynn tells him he could be the subject of mob violence. Hope imagines he's being lynched and he looks over at the crowd and appeals to such folks as Bing, Johnny Carson, John Wayne, and Flip Wilson for help in saving an innocent man. Bing says he furnished the rope for the lynching. Wilson says the devil made him do it. Carson says he hopes to inherit Hope's show and John Wayne says he'd like to help, but it isn't his picture.

By the way with that unbilled cameo, the Duke appears in his career in two films based on Louis L'Amour novels, his classic Hondo and this one.

Most of Hope's films in the sixties and now the seventies are just pale in comparison to the comedy classics of his earlier period. This one may be one of the worst. The gags just fall flat, the biggest laugh is when he tells the sheriff his age is 42 when he's a quite believable 69. John Wayne was finally playing characters his own age, why couldn't Hope?

So if you want to see a good film based on a Louis L'Amour novel, I recommend Hondo.

The narrator of Louis L'Amour's novel, "The Broken Gun" is a rugged novelist adventurer, a great deal like the author himself. The only character who comes from the book accurately is the evil ranch foreman, Reese, played by Forrest Tucker. Apparently, from the novel's dedication, Louis L'Amour visualized Alan Ladd as Dan, the hero. The William Bendix character would have been the lawman, Riley.

Bob Hope sought to recapture the magic of his vastly superior mystery-comedies, "The Cat and the Canary" and "Ghost Breakers" with Paulette Goddard; "My Favorite Blonde" with Madeleine Carroll; "My Favorite Brunette" with Dorothy L'Amour; and "My Favorite Spy" with Hedy Lamarr. "Cancel My Reservation" suffers from dated gags just meant to get a quick laugh, rather than to move the story ahead.

Paul Bogart directed this picture, in a nominal sense; but Bob was the executive producer. Any credit or blame goes to our star, who was otherwise a great entertainer.

The best scene is a skit within the movie, when Bob visualizes his lynching, attended gleefully by Bing Crosby (of course), Johnny Carson, John Wayne, and the latest hot TV star, Flip Wilson. Johnny observes, "He'll do anything to win an Oscar."

The screenwriter of this movie was Arthur Marx, son of Groucho. Arthur and Bob must have had a major falling out, since the writer penned a vicious unauthorized biography of his former boss. Other writers remained loyal to their former benefactor, such as Larry Gelbart, Sherwood Schwartz, and Melville Shavelson.