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Professor Huxley's Re-Education: "Bringing
Up Baby" (1938) (VHS)
Review Copyright Roger Zotti,
2000
"There were no normal people in it. I learned my lesson
and don't ever again intend to make everyone crazy." So spoke Howard Hawks
about Bringing Up Baby, his hilarious screwball comedy that when first released
met with critical and commercial failure.
Since its release, however, the years have been kind to the film, and
it has become one of Hollywood's most engaging comedies.
Katharine Hepburn plays rich, zany Susan Vance. Cary Grant is professor
David Huxley, a stolid paleontologist who plans to marry his wealthy assistant
and then receive an endowment for his museum.
Susan, though, has other ideas: She has fallen in love with David. Nothing
will stand in her way of getting him.
Add to the mix a precious clavicle, two leopards (the tame one is named
Baby; the other one, mistaken for Baby, is aggressive), a perky terrier
named George, some madcap characters, and you have a wonderful screwball
comedy.
Then another professor reminds David that he and Alice are getting married
tomorrow and "the occasion calls for a celebration." David responds by
saying he and Alice are, indeed, going to celebrate: "We're going to go
away directly after we've been married."
Alice disagrees. "Why what are you thinking of David?" Adamant that
nothing should interfere with his project, she declares: "Our marriage
must entail no domestic entanglements of any kind."
Reluctantly, David agrees.
And that's his problem: He's content to live a passionless, overly cerebral,
and predictable life.
Returning to the museum with the clavicle that George the terrier had
buried (that's a story in itself), Susan apologizes to David for turning
his world upside down: the precious clavicle was lost; he was arrested
and tossed in jail (which is the film's funniest scene), and a variety
of other hilarious mishaps.
But David surprises her by saying he has never had a better time in
his whole life.
Overjoyed, Susan cries out: "That means you must like me a little bit."
David more than likes her. "Yes, I love you, I think," he says.
But after his many misadventures with Susan, he has been re-educated.
For David now knows that Susan, despite her unpredictability and inspired
lunacy, is much more important than grim Alice, the dinosaur project,
or the museum.
To put a final stamp on matters, Susan destroys David's project. Without
missing a beat, David--the new David, that is --is able to forgive her.
Embracing, they express their mutual love,
And Bringing Up Baby couldn't have ended on a happier note.
Barry Fitzgerald, especially in the jail scene, is a riot; Charles Ruggles
plays wacky Major Applegate to perfection; and George the dog is cleverly
played by Asta.
Dudley Nichols and Hager Wilde wrote the inspired screenplay.
Kudos to Howard Hawks for making a sparkling movie with--thankfully--no
normal people in it.
The Project
After Alice Sparrow, David's fiancee, says, "Quiet, Professor Huxley is
thinking," she tells him the clavicle, the last bone he needs to complete
the brontosaurus project he has been working on for four years, will arrive
tomorrow. Of course, he's elated.
Calamities
Cut to the film's last scene.
Reborn!
At the start of the film David was wrapped up in a lifeless existence.
Performances
Under Hawks's deft, fast-paced direction, Hepburn displays fine comedic
sensitivity ( watch her uproarious imitation of a gangster's moll in the
jail scene), while Grant, repeatedly befuddled as the bespectacled professor,
is tremendous.
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