This movie is possibly the worst example of both a romantic comedy and a comedy of errors. While there is a stellar cast (non-headliners include Charles Ruggles as Major Applegate, and May Robson as Aunt Elizabeth) this movie fails to make itself believable in any way. The internet tells me this is called a screwball comedy. A genre often known for fast-paced talking, zany behaviors, and absurdist humor. Being that this movie is possibly the most absurd thing I’ve ever watched, this may very well fit the category.
Cary Grant plays a paleontologist by the name of David Huxley. He is sent on a mission by his secretary/fiancé (Virginia Walker) to sweet talk a donor interested in giving a $1,000,000 donation. While on the green David hooks a ball and has to leave lawyer Alexander Peabody (George Irving) alone while he chases down his ball. A young lady accidentally takes his ball, then attempts to steal his car forcing David to abandon Mr. Peabody on the green.
In a valiant attempt to rally David pursues Mr. Peabody to a dinner reservation. He again runs into the woman who introduces herself as Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn). Instead of steering clear of her David ends up in a series of ridiculous situations, all again brought on by Miss Vance. In what I can only call a complete loss of his senses David continues to stay in contact with Susan who tries to make amends, all attempts go poorly for David.
This movie just continues to get more absurd, and I had no sympathy for David as he continued to allow himself to be led into more and more ridiculous situations. How David loses his engagement after all of this is clear, the woman and him never would’ve connected in any meaningful way. How he ends up with Miss Vance at the end remains a mystery. Any sane person would never have allowed themselves into multiple encounters with the woman, and certainly wouldn’t try to pursue a romantic relationship with them.
Miss Vance’s family certainly seems to think her insane. Her comments about falling in love with David early in the film, definitely support the theory. One can only assume Miss Vance has floated through life on her aunt’s money since she clearly hasn’t got a single brilliant thought in her mind. This film is terrible and should only be watched to observe how terrible it is.
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Cori Domschot
Cori is a writer, wife, and mother to two adorable kiddos.
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Wow!! Talk about going against the grain of critical consensus.
While I think BUB is the high point of stylization of screwball farce, it pushes the energy level so high that it veers into pure abstraction. That’s probably why it has such a high reputation among film writers and scholars, but why it has had a harder time connecting to audiences outside of hardcore cinephile circles.
One of the themes that distinguishes 30s rom-coms from those of later eras is how women drive the narrative forward, often because their wealth allows them the means to exercise control, as well as personal (and romantic) fulfillment. BUB is the most merciless depiction of gender inequity in the genre, depicting the gynocracy in terms of emasculation and the leveling of patriarchy as a means to maintain that power. It’s humor doesn’t arise from domesticity taming the animalistic nature of society, but its ruthlessly Darwinian depiction of feminine mastery and command. It’s hyperbolic comedic aesthetic barely masks a tough, unsentimental view of social relations that makes the latent feminism of its world building problematic in how it bases its gender inversions is based on a very masculine view of human progress. Again, that the film’s reputational recovery at the hand of auteurist critics in the 1960s, the same group that championed more “masculine” genres like the Western, isn’t surprising.
This movie made me laugh like a hyena. I think its critical reputation and the fact that it’s all black and white and classy feeling to our jaded 21st-century eyes makes it harder to accept as a farce, but once I got past that it went down much more easily. It’s running more on Looney Tunes logic than Casablanca.