Il y aura toujours des femmes

A light piece of fluff, but enjoyable fluff! Watch out for the last scene with the great chase - some fantastic and hilarious acrobatics done there. Bob Hope fans, you can't miss this one. Non-fans, give it a go anyway, it's so silly that you'll laugh!

Unlike the typical Bob Hope film, "Here Come the Girls" is a musical--with only a bit of comedy here and there. So, for me the film was a bit of a disappointment--mostly because I was expecting laughs, not song and dance numbers.

Hope plays a not particularly talented member of the chorus. His prospects to move beyond that are nil--mostly because he's not all that good. However, when a homicidal maniac begins stalking the lead in the play (Arlene Dahl), the cops and theater owners get the bright idea of putting Hope in the lead--that way, if Hope is killed due to the psycho's jealousy, at least he's easy to replace! While a normal guy would soon suspect something, Hope's character is his typical fat-headed guy who soon begins believing it when everyone begins trying to convince him he's brilliant in the part--and he is truly terrible. Rosemary Clooney's character cares about Hope and tries her best to convince him of the truth--but he's just too self-absorbed to believe her.

Throughout this clever idea for a plot, there are LOTS of musical numbers--LOTS! None of the music is particularly memorable and I felt it all bogged down the film--making the comedy come to a grinding halt again and again. Not a terrible film...just not a particularly enjoyable one.

Bob Hope plays the tanglefooted chorus boy who constantly fouls things up for producer Fred Clark and stars Tony Martin and Arlene Dahl in this film set in the gaslight era in New York. Clark, who had the best slow burn in film next to Edgar Kennedy, finally has had enough. He gives Hope the royal boot, but then a big problem happens. Arlene Dahl has attracted the unwanted attentions of a psychopathic killer played by Robert Strauss. He attacks and nearly kills her co-star and boyfriend Tony Martin. What to do? Get some schnook, reasons Clark, to be a new leading man just long enough for Strauss to make his move and cop William Demarest to nab him. I think you figured out the schnook they had in mind.

It's a pretty funny film with Hope getting into one situation after another with his only friend being chorus girl Rosemary Clooney truly on his side. You would think that with a couple of singers like Tony Martin and Rosemary Clooney in the film they would have been given at least one duet. But the Jay Livingston-Ray Evans score is serviceable, nothing more. No hit songs came out of it for anyone.

But its classic Bob Hope and it even has an appearance by a young kid playing Bang Crosby (I kid you not). Good enjoyable fun.

Here Come the Girls is directed by Claude Binyon and written by Edmund L. Hartmann. It stars Bob Hope, Arlene Dahl, Tony Martin, Rosemary Clooney, Millard Mitchell, William Demarest, Fred Clark and Robert Strauss. Music is by Lyn Murray and cinematography by Lionel Lyndon.

Hope is inept "chorus boy" Stanley Snodgrass, who after getting fired from the revue of Here Comes the Girls, gets a second chance. Unbeknown to him, though, he is being used as bait to lure serial killer Jack the Slasher out into the open.

Hearty and frothy and lush with Technicolor pleasures, Here Come the Girls is everything a committed Bob Hope fan could want. He gets to bound about with his usual energy, sing, crack sharp one-liners and flirt with a sexy woman; or two! The turn of the century setting is most appealing, the costuming equally so, and while the musical numbers are average fare, they serve good framework for Hope's goofery.

How middle class!

Around Hope, though, it's a mixed bag of performances, where it's Clark who shines brightest as the show's grouchy impresario who is literally willing the Slasher (Strauss having a great time of it) to rid him of Snodgrass! Dahl is socko sexy (check out that hour glass figure in an eye scorching purple frock), and Clooney's legs are a sight for sore eyes.

His fling is flang.

Better songs and a better director would have lifted it to greater heights, but Hope on form was usually enough to keep a comedy in credit, which is the case here. With characters called Bang Crosby and Jack the Slasher you know where the picture is at, while we also get the world's scariest clown to keep things on the black comedy simmer. 7/10

BOB HOPE's screen career was still at the crest of the wave when he did HERE COME THE GIRLS, but was soon to descend with a bunch of largely forgettable films, beginning with CASANOVA'S BIG NIGHT in 1954. From then on, Hope's films were less enjoyable than during his heyday when he hit his stride in '39's CAT AND THE CANARY and had a string of memorable comedy hits.

Hope is improbably cast as a chorus boy with two left feet (he describes himself as "the world's oldest living chorus boy"), and ROSEMARY CLOONEY is the girl who sticks by him when the going gets rough and he loses his job when fired by stage manager, FRED CLARK.

The zany plot has him chosen by the theater manager to be the bait to attract a killer called The Slasher, who is anxious to get revenge on any man close to ARLENE DAHL when leading man TONY MARTIN is unable to go on. The plot depends heavily on this one note gimmick for laughs and it does manage to get them despite the lightweight script.

Clooney and Martin both get a couple of ballads to sing, none of them the least bit memorable, and the lavish musical numbers are staged with some flair. Hope gets the laughs as things go wrong whenever he sets foot on the stage. ROBERT STRAUSS is the killer on the loose and he does a good job of combining villainy with comic skill.

Strictly second-rate stuff, but pleasantly handled by the agreeable cast. Biggest drawback is that Hope is really woefully too old for the role of the chorus boy, constantly being referred to as "the boy" throughout.