My Favorite Brunette Reviews

In what ranks as one of his best comedies, Hope plays a harried baby photographer who is asked by his private-eye pal to watch his detective business for a few days while he goes on vacation. Hope agrees and finds himself getting involved with a lot more than watching dust settle. Believing Hope to be the real private eye, Lamour hires him to search for her uncle, a wealthy baron who has vanished, and gives the dubious detective a map, warning him to guard it with his life. Hope goes off to the palatial estate of a former associate of the missing man, Dingle, who introduces Hope to a wheelchair-bound man who is supposedly Lamour's uncle. Hoyt, a doctor who is present, insists that Lamour has a few screws loose. Hope is just about convinced of the veracity of Dingle and Hoyt's story until he is about to leave and spots the "disabled" baron walking about. When Hope snaps a quick picture, Dingle gets one of his crazed henchmen (Lorre in a wonderful self-parody) to knock out Hope and recover the film. In an effort to determine the importance of the map, Hope and Lamour pay a visit to the geologist who drew it, but Lorre has killed him, framing Hope for the murder. Minutes before Hope is to be executed, fresh evidence is discovered by Lamour, and the executioner, furious that his day has been ruined, takes off his hood and reveals himself to be none other than Hope's offscreen (and sometimes onscreen) pal Bing Crosby. "Boy," says Hope as he turns to the camera, "he'll take any kind of a part!" This is a classic Hope film, with one gag following another in rapid succession. Particularly good is Lorre, who was known at this stage in his career for doing films that approached this genre seriously. And Chaney's characterization of a dumb sanitarium guard so tough he cracks walnuts with his eyelids is great fun. Alan Ladd is equally amusing in his cameo role of the vacationing detective.