Customer Reviews

Beautiful Blonde From Bashful Bend [VHS]

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First time around this Preston Sturges (writer, producer, director)movie was given the thumbs down by most of the critics. However, today it is hailed as classic comedy, with a classy leading lady - Betty Grable! She the cutest li'l ole gunslinging saloon girl who shoots a judge (where it don't show) and legs it with her pal, Olga San Juan, to the next town along the line where she poses as a schoolmarm. Betty only has two numbers in this one, but her comedy performance is first-class, especially aided by Margaret Hamilton, Sterling Holloway, and a whole host of oldtimers. Great fun - if you don't take it too seriously! A very underrated Preston Sturges production. And it's a pity Grable wasn't allowed to do more wacky comedies like this. She's a natural.

The legend goes something like this: After Judy Garland dropped out of Annie Get Your Gun, MGM called Zanuck, head of 20th Century Fox, and asked if he would loan out Betty Grable to replace her. After thinking about it over the weekend, Zanuck called Mayer back and said, "Why the hell should I loan out my golden girl when I've got a better property to star her in?" The better property? The Beautiful Blonde from Bashful Bend! Despite starring Hollywood's number one female (Grable was on the Top 10 Box Office list for 10 consecutive years) and being written and directed by one of the best in the business, Preston Sturges (in his autobiography Sturges writes that this was a misfire, and that Betty Grable was so great to work with and such an excellent comedienne she deserved much better) the picture tanked. Today, surprisingly, it plays much better. Grable's comedic talents really do shine (Sturgis was right!) and she gets better than able support from Cesar Romero, Rudy Vallee, Olga San Juan, Porter Hall and Sterling Holloway (as a pair of hilarious hillbilly twins) plus Hugh Herbert who steals all of his scenes as a nearsighted doc. Grable's opening saloon number is to die for. And the shootin' gets a few laughs, as well.

At the time of release, this movie was really regarded as a stinker by everyone: critics, Grable, Zanuck ( after the preview, he said that Sturges crucified Grable in this film), and the public ( it turned out to be one of the few films with Grable as the top bill that did not make money in the US market).

I think the best way to describe the film is in comparing it to "Blazing Saddles". The Beautiful Blond from Bashful Bend is also a farce based on the Western film genre. Unfortunately, while Sturges might have had a great premise in sending up the Western, he can't supply the jokes and gags like Mel Brooks did some 20 years later. Of course, Mel Brooks had almost none of the censorship restrictions that Sturges had in 1949, and maybe that is what makes Blazing Saddles so much more hilarious than this bomb.

In retrospect the movie has its moments, but it probably will only appeal to classic movie buffs who have an interest in Sturges or Grable. I think Grable carried herself quite well with poor material, as comedy was one of her natural talents ( she was known as quite a "clown" on and off the movie set). Even so, this "farce" is just not that funny. Considering the writing that had made Sturges such a success as a screenwriter then writer/director, the dialogue is contrived and stilted. You can see where the "jokes" are supposed to be, but usually they fall flat.

Most people will be better off passing this "classic" up, even the film buffs.

The film begins with a scene of the heroine, Freddie, as a sweet little girl of about seven, with beautiful, golden ringlets, whose grandfather is teaching her to be a dead-eye shot in order keep herself safe in a harsh world when he is no longer around to protect her. In the next scene we meet Freddie all grown up into a gorgeous saloon singer (Betty Grable), performing in a sexy version of a 19th century corset as she sings and dances.

Freddie's close relationship with a gun has continued into her adult life, but it gets her into trouble shortly after the story begins. She accidentally shoots Judge O'Toole (Porter Hall, best known for his role as the pompous psychologist Granville Sawyer in Miracle on 34th Street) in the behind--twice--when her friends grab her and throw off her aim at her cheating boyfriend Blackie (Cesar Romero), a handsome, womanizing gambler. The judge refuses to fall for Betty's attempt to charm him into forgiving her (watch in that scene for Margaret Hamilton, the Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz, in an uncredited small part as the judge's wife, Mrs. Elvira O'Toole).

To escape being sent to prison by the vindictive judge, Freddie flees town on the train with her Mexican best friend Conchita (Olga San Juan, whose real-life nickname was the "Puerto Rican Pepperpot," a comically-talented, charismatic supporting actress cast in many 1940's musical comedies). Conchita has swiped the luggage of a dead school teacher and insists that they will be fine if they escape to a town far down the train line where Freddie can impersonate the teacher and Conchita will pretend to be the teacher's Native American companion. Unfortunately, the sheriff has posted a wanted poster for Freddie with a reward for her capture, and Blackie overhears the stationmaster talk about a blonde who got on the train who looked nothing like any school teacher he's ever seen before.

I love Betty Grable, but I can see why this movie did badly when it was released in 1949. In spite of her considerable comic and musical talents--and the wonderful supporting cast--what could have been a terrific premise for the story is poorly actualized. Which is shocking considering the screenwriter/producer is no less than the brilliant Preston Sturges (Sullivan's Travels, The Lady Eve, The Palm Beach Story).

However, the scenes with Freddie performing on the stage and running the small country school, as well as Freddie's scenes with the delightfully spunky and conniving Conchita, are worth putting up with the rest of the film. It is definitely hilarious when Freddie uses her sharpshooting skills to terrify into obedience two rowdy, smoking, drinking, older students played with broad, comic effect by Dan Jackson (a character actor who was 24 at the time) and Sterling Holloway (a very young-looking 44-year-old also playing a teenager who is the famous voice of many well-known Disney animated characters, including the Cheshire Cat in the 1951 Alice in Wonderland, Kaa the snake in The Jungle Book, and Winnie the Pooh in various Disney productions).

I would have liked to see a stronger development of a romantic relationship with a highly eligible, wealthy, and very sweet local bachelor, Charles Hingleman (played by a well-preserved, 48-year-old Rudy Vallee--who gets no chance to croon in this movie), rather than the focus on Freddie's love/hate relationship with the worthless Blackie. I also personally experienced the slapstick shootout in the climax as interminably and boringly dragged out. But that's just my opinion. For those who like slapstick gunplay, it might be funny, and I did enjoy the fancy shooting Freddie did at the close of the scene (which has been imitated in other comic Westerns since, such as Cat Ballou).

***SPOILER ALERT FOR THE REST OF THIS REVIEW***
The ending of the movie was disappointing to me personally, but no doubt dramatically inevitable, given the romantic choices Freddie is offered in the film due to a relationship with Charles not being presented as a viable alternative to Blackie, and the slapstick focus in the film in general, which carries all the way through the final scene. Basically, there is no traditional happily ever after that is normally expected in comedy, or even some kind of truly positive resolution. Instead, Sturges has created a frustrating, "back to square one" type of ending.