As others have said, Claudette Colbert is great, the "Kettles" are great, Fred MacMuray is Fred MacMurray, there are some laughs, BUT....
My son and I were ready to take the MacMurray character out back and have a "talk" with him. (SPOILER WARNING: in three, two, one....)
So, for starters, he quits his job, and doesn't tell his wife until the next day. Then he announces he's decided they'll move and do something totally different in which they have no experience. She goes along with it with a great attitude; good for her, what a terrifically good sport (to put the nicest face on it).
But it gets WAY worse.
So this guy keeps associating with this clearly adultery-minded woman, over his wife's objections, blithely and arrogantly. Then he spends all hours at her house. Meanwhile, his wife faints at the fair and learns she's pregnant. She goes home, makes a wonderful dinner, and waits for him until after 11pm, if I read the clock right. She gets a note saying he's not coming home (no "love," no apology, nothing).
She leaves him. (The precipitiveness of this can be argued, but....)
So for NINE MONTHS, all he does is send her some letters, and otherwise nothing. What, the roads don't run in two directions in their state? No one tells him his wife fainted at the fair? He doesn't notice the burnt dinner and nice setup she made for him?
In the meanwhile, she goes through her entire pregnancy and has the baby, and he doesn't bother to come by.
And then, against all reason, and still (in her mind) suspecting he'd behaved immorally with this hussy, she goes back to him, telling the baby what a swell guy he is.
And rather than grovel in apologies, he gets mad at her and clearly feels very self-righteous about it.
That's only one thing about this, but it was SO unsettling that, in spite of the other genuine charms and laughs, it left a bad taste in our mouths.
My son and I were ready to take the MacMurray character out back and have a "talk" with him. (SPOILER WARNING: in three, two, one....)
So, for starters, he quits his job, and doesn't tell his wife until the next day. Then he announces he's decided they'll move and do something totally different in which they have no experience. She goes along with it with a great attitude; good for her, what a terrifically good sport (to put the nicest face on it).
But it gets WAY worse.
So this guy keeps associating with this clearly adultery-minded woman, over his wife's objections, blithely and arrogantly. Then he spends all hours at her house. Meanwhile, his wife faints at the fair and learns she's pregnant. She goes home, makes a wonderful dinner, and waits for him until after 11pm, if I read the clock right. She gets a note saying he's not coming home (no "love," no apology, nothing).
She leaves him. (The precipitiveness of this can be argued, but....)
So for NINE MONTHS, all he does is send her some letters, and otherwise nothing. What, the roads don't run in two directions in their state? No one tells him his wife fainted at the fair? He doesn't notice the burnt dinner and nice setup she made for him?
In the meanwhile, she goes through her entire pregnancy and has the baby, and he doesn't bother to come by.
And then, against all reason, and still (in her mind) suspecting he'd behaved immorally with this hussy, she goes back to him, telling the baby what a swell guy he is.
And rather than grovel in apologies, he gets mad at her and clearly feels very self-righteous about it.
That's only one thing about this, but it was SO unsettling that, in spite of the other genuine charms and laughs, it left a bad taste in our mouths.