Whenever I run low on unseen movies to record, I check TCM for titles I've seen before but don't remember. In this wise, I found PILLOW TO POST. It didn't fire off any neurons, but it had Vincent Sherman directing Ida Lupino, Sidney Greenstreet, and lesser Warner Brothers supporting players. It was a comedy and the rating I had given it was that it was superior. So I set it to record, intending to watch it as part of my weekend waking up routine.
Ida Lupino takes a job in the waning days of the Second World War working as a saleswoman for her father's oil company. Out in the hinterlands, she needs a place to sleep, but between the oil fields and an Army training base, the only place she can find is a motel -- and they accept only married officers and their wives. So Ida ropes in William Prince to get a night's sleep. Complications, as they say, ensue.
Looking at it, I don't understand what I was thinking when I thought it was very good. It's directed in that frantic, forced, smirking manner the Warners set for their comedy B movies in the late 1930s, when they realized they couldn't talk about sex, but they could wink and everyone would get it. It's lazy writing and rote performances and no one is having a good time, except possibly for Barbara Brown and I don't know why I thought it was so good when I saw it before. Maybe it was the (brief) appearance of Louis Armstrong and his orchestra.
Whatever it was, it isn't enough now. I guess my taste has changed. I hope it's for the better.
Ida Lupino takes a job in the waning days of the Second World War working as a saleswoman for her father's oil company. Out in the hinterlands, she needs a place to sleep, but between the oil fields and an Army training base, the only place she can find is a motel -- and they accept only married officers and their wives. So Ida ropes in William Prince to get a night's sleep. Complications, as they say, ensue.
Looking at it, I don't understand what I was thinking when I thought it was very good. It's directed in that frantic, forced, smirking manner the Warners set for their comedy B movies in the late 1930s, when they realized they couldn't talk about sex, but they could wink and everyone would get it. It's lazy writing and rote performances and no one is having a good time, except possibly for Barbara Brown and I don't know why I thought it was so good when I saw it before. Maybe it was the (brief) appearance of Louis Armstrong and his orchestra.
Whatever it was, it isn't enough now. I guess my taste has changed. I hope it's for the better.