The Time, the Place and the Girl

A very funny movie. Dennis Morgan and Jack Carson are two guys who want to put on a musical, but they need a backer. Also hindering their plans is an orchestra conductor (S.Z. Sakall) who lives next door and doesn't like their "noise". Morgan simply has the conductor's daughter (Martha Vickers) - who is also an opera singer - fall in love with him. Then everyone gets along fine. Lots of good one-liners - Sakall gets a lot of the laughs. One of my favorite actresses, Janis Paige, also appears, as one of the show's stars (and Carson's girlfriend, if I remember correctly). There's one number that Morgan sings in blackface and there's a big production number with all the dancing girls dressed as cows that has just got to be seen to be believed! The only time I was bored was during the tap dancing - I have trouble watching that. Keep your ears clear for the best line, spoken by Vickers to Morgan - "I don't want the best, I want you!". I could say something similar to this film.

My Mother, Martha Vickers was in this wonderful movie , that I love to this day and still sing " Met a Gal In Calico"...I lost my mother Martha when I was 16 and now I will be 50 in June...so many moons ago but I can still get this movie to view at Eddie Brandts on Vineland and watch it and smile and still sing the songs from this wonderful movie....as it is her best I feel she has done....even better then the Big Sleep!....go and get it and enjoy!... This movie was never put on video but you can get it from Eddie Brandt on Vineland as long as you rent another movie...so if you are there then get my mothers other movie, " That Way with women" another great classic and then you get these two for free and just have to rent tow other movies..do it!...

Pleasant musical, colorfully produced, but with more plot and talk than necessary for a musical. The plot's well worn—the guys and gals want to put on a musical in spite of a couple of killjoys (Bates & Woods). Seems the money needed for the show keeps getting passed around between good guys and not-so-good guys. Anyway, count on Morgan and Carson to get things right. The musical numbers are eye-catching, especially the rope-twirling "Calico", along with tap-dancing whirlwinds the Condo Brothers. I expect one reason for the talk is the large number of featured players, from Morgan to Bates. Each name player has to get enough dialogue to maintain status and pay-rate.

This is still early in the Morgan-Carson pairing, so fans may be disappointed they don't get more shtick. Nonetheless, their chemistry shows promise. And, of course, there's Cuddles Sakall doing his ain't-I-adorable bit, which of course he is. But the real surprise, to me at least, is noir vamp Martha Vickers. None of that here; instead, she shines in a sparkly role I would never have suspected. Too bad she never rose to the level her talent clearly warranted. For those fans of 40's women's big hats, catch Paige's menacing flower combo early on. I'm surprised the actress kept her head.

Anyway, it's an eye-catching 100-minutes, and if not memorable, at least entertaining.

The beautiful "Oh, But I Do," is the Arthur Schwartz theme song of this Warners entry, with "Calico" and "Rainy Night in Rio" completing the tuneful bill.

These fine numbers are given full production numbers to their credit, which are colorful and pleasing.

There's nothing wrong with the casting either, headed by the lovable Dennis Morgan and versatile Jack Carson.

If only the scripting were better. It's really quite stock writing, with formula lines and situations--nothing special.

Don't know about you, but having "blackface numbers" pop up from nowhere for laughs is increasingly irksome in these period pieces.

All in all, a slight pastiche in the WB stock company folio.

Warner Brothers did for Dennis Morgan and Jack Carson something that Paramount until the Road To Bali never did for Bing and Bob. The Time, The Place And The Girl was done in some really nice technicolor and they gave the musical numbers by Arthur Schwartz and Leo Robin full production numbers. They could do this because a great deal of the film has a nightclub setting.

A nightclub setting that Morgan and Carson own and are trying to open. But they are next door to S.Z. Sakall and Florence Bates and their townhouse. Sakall is a symphony conductor and their granddaughter Martha Vickers is studying grand opera. Funny we hear no operatic notes from her.

What to do but send the old lady killer Morgan into action. But he really falls for Vickers. I think you can figure the rest out.

The musical numbers are not as elaborate as Busby Berkeley stuff in the Thirties, but are more elaborate than Road films numbers which only had the Crosby/Hope personalities to put them across and they certainly didn't do a bad job.

One interesting bit of casting is that of Donald Woods as Sakall's business manager who plays it like Edward Everett Horton and threatens to close the whole club down and ruin Morgan and Carson. A change of pace for Woods who was never quite a leading man, but was a chameleon like actor who fit into many characters without a bit of personality usually. Here he borrows Horton's.

Dennis's light tenor and Carson's antics are always entertaining.