Young at heart (Doris Day)

(Amazon UK link)

Another Tuesday evening, another opportunity to watch a film with my husband. We had quite liked ‘Pillow talk’, with Doris Day, when we watched it in September. So we decided to watch another film with the same star, which we were given by a friend who was downsizing earlier in the year. 

Doris Day plays a young woman called Laurie in this film. She lives with her father, her father’s sister Aunt Jessie (wonderfully portrayed by Ethel Barrymore), and her two older sisters in a large mansion. Her father Greg (Robert Keith) is a musician, and all three girls have learned to play instruments so they often play together in an ensemble. Fran (Dorothy Malone ), the oldest of the girls, arrives back from a date with Bob (Alan Hale Jr) and announces that they are engaged.

Laurie and her middle sister Amy (Elisabeth Fraser) talk about having a double wedding, or staying old maids together. Laurie has no young man in mind, although it’s clear that their plumber Ernie (Lonny Chapman) is very keen on Amy. Into their lives - via a litter of puppies at their neighbour’s - comes a competent, confident young man called Alex (Gig Young). He composes musicals, rather to Greg’‘s disgust, but he’s full of charm and very persuasive. He not only has dinner with the family, making it clear that he’s very attracted to Laurie, but becomes a house guest.

All three of the girls like Alex very much, despite him being somewhat overbearing at times, but he has eyes only for Laurie. We see them at the beach, and there are some light-hearted moments - it’s not a comedy, exactly, but there were places where I smiled. There might have been amusing comments that I missed since the dialogue was quite fast and strongly accented, so I realised that I missed quite a bit. 

We knew that Frank Sinatra was billed as Doris Day’s co-star but he doesn’t appear until quite a way into the film. He plays Barney, a cynical, rather depressed musician who plays in restaurants, and who does the arranging of Alex’s music. Barney is convinced that life is against him, that he will never have a ‘hit’, and that if anything good happens, he’ll soon be brought down. 

Laurie, who is cheerful and upbeat, can't believe that anyone can be quite as cynical as Barney. She does her best to persuade him to smile, and to be more positive, not realising that he is starting to fall for her. She and Alex seem made for each other...

The acting, 1950s style, is over-played, and we didn’t think there was much chemistry between any of the characters, let alone the ones who ended up getting married. There’s a fair bit of singing - not ‘musical’ style, but in appropriate situations; mostly in the house, as part of a family get-together, or elsewhere, trying out a new song. Both Doris Day and Frank Sinatra sing very well, of course, and I liked the music sections of the film. 

It’s quite a complex story, too. It includes some traumatic scenes, with a jilting at the altar, almost literally, and a marriage that is very one-sided. There's also a dangerous drive through a snowstorm, with increasingly ominous background music… and more. It’s perhaps a bit slow-paced by today’s standards, and some of  the direction and filming seemed a bit crude. But the story is well-told, the ending quite satisfactory.  

I doubt if we’ll watch it again, but it was worth seeing once. The rating is U, although I’d have thought PG would be more appropriate, given the tense nature of some of the incidents. But there’s no bad language, no nudity or even innuendoes.  There’s a lot of cigarette smoking, but that’s not unusual for this era.  It’s not the kind of film likely to appeal to anyone under the age of about 12 anyway. 

Review copyright 2024 Sue's DVD Reviews