What's Up, Doc? (1972)

One of the worst movies I've ever seen

Let's be realistic.

A bit overrated, but still an amazing film

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

I first watched this sometime in the 80's, and after having seen it hundreds of times, it is still so funny. It never occurred to anyone that there might be more than one type of suitcase.

Now this is one movie I wish I could have seen in the theater! Accompanied by popcorn and something to drink, what fun this would be! I have seen this on television and also on video.This is one film that takes superb actors who know their craft well and places them in the zaniest mix-ups but also assumes that the viewer has some intelligence. The main protagonist is a professor - a musicologist (basically a musical historian) - who meets up with someone who would be known as a "professional student" in today's vernacular. Mix-ups ensue, hotel rooms burn, and most importantly, look-alike overnight bags - 4 in all - in a loud plaid color - get mixed up. From secret government underwear to precious jewels, I tried to keep track of which bag was where the last time I watched this movie. I couldn't do it! I lost track about 30 minutes in.This is a funny movie that I recommend for families to watch. (One caution: If you don't want your little ones to see Barbara Streisand taking a bubble-bath or come out of the bathroom wearing nothing but a towel, then maybe select something else. Even so, this movie is G rated, believe it or not.)This is one of the great films of all time - just because it is fun, funny, and intelligent. I like to watch it if I need a good laugh.

I wish I enjoyed this movie more, as others seem to have found it very funny.But for me, most of it, the scenes in the hotel, were too clearly an attempt to come up with an equivalent of a Feydeau bedroom farce like *The Lady from Maxim's* or *A Flea in her Ear*. The timing was wrong, though, and the lines too forced.Once we got out of the hotel and started driving all over San Francisco, it got funnier for me, but I didn't find it very original. Keystone Cops.Again, I wish I could have found it funnier - I was in a good mood - but it just seemed forced and imitative to me.

"Watch it!" Streisand spouts during a duet of "You're the Top" when Ryan O'Neal sings "You're the nose..." Of course, she's delighted with his retort of "On the great Durante". That's just one indication of the style of comedy here, a throw-back to "Hellzapoppin'" with its "Airplane!" style like gags and of course the great screwball comedies of the 1930's and 40's. Streisand is at her most gorgeous here, with long flowing blonde hair, and O'Neal gets past his poster-boy good looks by playing a rather nebbish character who has about as much romance here as Slim Pickens."When you go to San Francisco, wear a flower in your hair!", the famous song says, and this is exactly that era, not quite "Tales of the City", yet flowing with memories of one of the most visually exciting cities on the West coast. The plot starts off where all San Francisco movies should start, the airport, and when you get your first glimpse of Streisand, stalking O'Neal for a reason that is never made clear, you are entranced. She makes small talk with him in a drug store, a vision which does not go unnoticed by his obnoxious fiancée (Madeline Kahn in her film debut), and ends up at the same hotel where ironically his briefcase (filled with rocks) looks exactly like the one held by the short-skirted matron (Mabel Albertson) who is carrying her valuable jewelry collection. Albertson, by the time this film is over, will have one of her famous "Bewitched" sick headaches, tripped very hysterically by future "Boss Hogg" Sorrel Booke and at one point falling down on the hotel floor, smacking the carpet in tears when her jewelry case is stolen.Kenneth Mars, who would go onto film immortality by playing the metal-armed police inspector in "Young Frankenstein", plays O'Neal's rival for a business contract to be handed out by the subtly wise-cracking Austin Pendleton, and John Hillerman is the epitome of drollness as the hotel manager who suggests O'Neal leave the hotel room he is occupying. "When?", O'Neal asks. "Yesterday", Hillerman responds, just as bluntly as he would do much later with Tom Selleck on "Magnum P.I.". In between, you've got Kahn throwing tantrums, Streisand smirking and plotting as she poses as O'Neal's fiancée, and finally, an outrageous chase sequence through San Francisco where practically every famous location is shown, spoofing an earlier chase sequence in the very serious "Bullit", and later repeated (but not ripped off) in "Foul Play".Streisand gets to sing a bit of "As Time Goes By" here, in addition to "You're the Top" (over the opening and closing credits), and O'Neal even gets to spoof Ali MacGraw's famous line from "Love Story". Obviously a take-off on the Katharine Hepburn/Cary Grant comic masterpiece "Bringing Up Baby", "What's Up Doc?" still holds up freshly on its own, a modern classic even if it has passed the 40 year mark, and a master class in what modern comedy should be without being crude. Director Peter Bogdanavich was hot after "The Last Picture Show" and would remain fresh with "Paper Moon" but unfortunately, that success was short-lived.