Customer Reviews

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (Import, All Regions) (1947)

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Need someone to save the girl from a vicious blackmailer in a western? Walter Mitty is here. Need a highly skilled doctor to perform a nerve-racking surgery while up against the clock? Walter Mitty is the man. Need an expertly skilled air pilot to fly in World War 2, or a comedian/entertainer to help all the boys forget about the war with his little musical number? Yes, you guessed it: Walter Mitty.

This is by far one of my favorite stories to read and best loved films. Based on James Thurber's story, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty stretches this story into a 100 minute feature film. Reportedly Thurber didn't like the movie too much, but, honestly, I believe there is little not to love in this movie. It does a superb job projecting the character Walter Mitty Thurber seemed to want to create. There is quite a deal more depth given to this character in the movie, and this is a good thing. Instead of just being a simple-minded man who dreams away from his uneventful life and wife to bigger and better things, this Walter Mitty leads two lives-the real, and the dream-which seemingly interconnect during the film.

There are subtle differences from the short story. For instance, Walter's wife (in the story) is replaced with his nagging mother in the film. He is going to be married, and is not only nagged by his mother but also his fianc?. However, after he witnesses a murder, he begins to question what is real and what illusion is, including the girl of his dreams (Virginia Mayo).

Another superb aspect of the film is simply the performance by Danny Kaye. Kaye embodies the very essence of Walter Mitty so well-there are the goofy moments when he nervously struggles to get away from danger, the entertaining parts where he is singing about musical devices, or showing the latest fashion, and the adventurous scenes where he is trying to help his damsel-in-distress escape countless villains (one of which is played by none other than villain legend Boris Karloff).

Another great thing about the film is its quality. The DVD is in excellent quality, sound, transfer and color are fantastic. I'm so glad they brought this classic to DVD.

This is an exceptional movie for the family to enjoy, or just a movie to cheer you up. It definitely has the comedic flavor that we expect from Danny Kaye films.

I think we can all associate with the dreamer in Walter Mitty, because we all want to be heroic in some way.

I have been in love with this film since I first saw it on TV when I was a child. It is one of those classic Hollywood comedies that just makes you happy. It's got so much going for it: the incomparable Danny Kaye, a hilarious premise involving dangerous jewel thieves, lovely Virginia Mayo, wonderful fantasy/daydream sequences, and the sinister Boris Karloff.

Danny Kaye is completely in his element here, playing a nervous wimp who escapes his dull life (controlling mother, and tedious job at the paperback publishing company) through daydreams of romance and adventure.

Until I saw this movie I had no idea how very gifted Kaye was. He can make a reaction to toast popping up seem hysterically funny. His timing and acting are brilliant, and his physical comedy is formidable.
I just wish that he had made more comedy films in the 40's and 50's. But I suppose it's better to have done a few brilliant gems than a whole bunch of decent movies.
I also recommend his films "Wonder Man", "The Court Jester", "The Inspector General", and also "Knock on Wood" (that last one is basically impossible to find anymore, so I wish they'd do a box set of his dvd movies!)...

One of the all time classic comedic actors, Danny Kaye gives a charming and varied performance as day dreamer Walter Mitty. A helpless hopeful who works for a publishing company and constanly gets himself into trouble by dreaming his life more fantastic. Whether it be doctor, fighter pilot or gambling gentleman, he becomes the man he wishes he could be but is absolutely not. Charming, debonaire, brave and sophisticated. The real Walter Mitty posesses none of these attributes.

Things take a turn for him though as he finds himself mixed up with a beautiful woman who's in trouble and involved in a dangerous plan to retrieve a book containing locations for some hidden WWII paintings. A former nazi named "The Boot" is also aware of the book and will kill anyone in the way of securing it for himself.

Unfortunately for Walter, no one knows or believes his story as these people who constantly call on him for help are never around when anyone else is. His Boss, co-workers, and family all chalk it up to his wild imaginations and story writing career. This all makes for some funny moments where Walters secret life soon becomes his real life. But nobody knows it but him.

Danny Kaye does a wonderful job of selling every performance he's asked to. Every character he plays is totally different from the other and is a tribute to his versitility. He absolutely sells this movie and makes it work. A great performance. Keep an eye out for Boris Karloff in his psychiatrist role as well.

The disc works well for what it is. The color looks very good and natural. Overall, it's pretty clean and doesn't cause any unnecessary distractions. The audio is typically mono and focused to the front speakers. Everything is clearly heard and distinguishable. The score and dialog come across loud and clear.

This is a fun film for all ages. It works very well and can easily be watched again and again. Highly recommended.

While WONDER MAN and THE COURT JESTER might be more consistently wacky, I thought THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY (TSLoWM) brought out the vulnerable side of Danny Kaye, one of my faves since childhood (I never missed any of Kaye's movies on WPIX when I was growing up). It usually gets on my nerves when I see movie characters allowing themselves to be as put-upon and henpecked as Kaye's Walter is here, but there was a sweetness about him that made me root for him instead of merely growling, "Oh, tell 'em all to go to hell already" -- and as a result, it's that much more satisfying when Walter finally does tell off his obnoxious so-called friends and loved ones (unlike such "comedies of cruelty" as MADHOUSE, where the last 10 minutes of Revenge Against The Oppressors are the only entertaining parts of the movie)! Although James Thurber, another of my faves, reportedly tried to buy off producer Samuel Goldwyn to keep the film from being made and hated the finished product, I think perhaps Thurber wasn't being quite fair. First off, books and film have different storytelling requirements, and second, the first 10 minutes are almost straight from Thurber's story (except it's Walter and his nagging mom instead of a nagging wife), and it seemed to me that the characters and performances had very Thurberesque qualities about them. Boris Karloff and Konstantin Shayne are delightfully unctuous villains (Fun Fact: their henchman, Henry Corden, later became the voice of Fred Flintstone!). As Walter's literal and figurative dream girl Rosalind van Hoorn, frequent Kaye co-star Virginia Mayo was thoroughly beguiling and never looked lovelier (and hey, the radiant Mayo was a size 12 and nobody considered *her* a "plus size," thank you very much! :-). TSLoWM also contains two of my favorite Kaye/Sylvia Fine musical numbers: "Symphony for Unstrung Tongue" (am I the only one who finds the line "He gets so excited that he has a solo passage" to be subtly salacious? :-) and "Anatole of Paris." To top it all off, it takes place primarily in my hometown and favorite city, New York City, and is set in one of my favorite milieus, pulp magazine publishing! My hubby and I like to think that Uncle Peter's grand home must be located in the Riverdale section of the Bronx, where we used to live, since it looks like the kind of houses we used to see while walking around in the Fieldston area and it didn't seem to take horrifically long for Walter and Rosalind to drive there from the Flatiron district of Manhattan! :-) (Interestingly, the interior of the van Hoorn home looks a lot like the interior of evil Bruno Anthony's home in STRANGERS ON A TRAIN; anybody know if these scenes might have been shot in the same house/set?) I wish the DVD extras had included deleted scenes (there's a bit in the trailer with Karloff and Corden in a pub that I definitely don't recall seeing in the finished film), but it was nice to see Virginia Mayo still alive and well (and bigger than "size 12," but on her it's pleasant plumpness, in my opinion! :-) in the intro and outro, even though she only had time to say one line about most of her co-stars ("Ann Rutherford was delightful...Fay Bainter was a consummate actress...").

Walter Mitty (played by Danny Kaye) is an inveterate daydreamer - henpecked by his mother, unregarded by his fiancé, and abused by his boss. But, when a man is murdered in his presence, Walter soon finds himself protecting a beautiful woman and running from a group of ruthless hoodlums, and nobody believes that this isn't just another daydream. Now, all that Walter has to do is hold onto his sanity and save that girl! [Color, released in 1947, with a running time of 1 hour, 50 minutes.]

This is a fun movie! Any Danny Kaye (1913-87) movie is worth seeing, and this one is doubly so. It has Danny's great hijinks and his wonderful off kilter singing. I liked the storyline and all of the antics, and the fact that the whole family could sit down and laugh along to this great comedy. If you like good comedy, and want something family-friendly, then you can't do better than this movie - buy it!

When I first read the story of "Walter Mitty" in my Honors English class, I wasn't all that interested in it. However, when my teacher brought in the movie, Danny Kaye quickly became one of my favorite actors of all time! The movie got my cynical, freshman class (that usually doesn't laugh at anything except the local "court jester", if you understand) laughing as well! I absolutely enjoyed the number when Mr. Kaye is recalling his old music teacher. I feel as though he was, no IS, a predecessor to another of my favorite actors, Ryan Stiles. I just turned 15 and I love this very talented actor and this very hillarious movie. I strongly suggest that you get your own children to watch the works of Mr. Kaye ASAP. His acting talent needs to be shared with everyone! (By the way, the Thurber story is very good as well.)

I have seen The Secret Life of Walter Mitty once, but that was all it took for me to love it. The girl he played opposite was fantastic, and had worked with him before in various other movies. Kaye's character in this movie had some pretty wild day-dreams, and sometimes those day dreams got him into trouble. When the girl of those dreams came into his real world, it was funny to watch how he dealt with it. Kaye's talent for singing, and the bar scene in which he played the pilot and pretended to be his old high school teacher, I thought it was the best part of the movie. Any one can love the way that Kaye loves and sometimes loses, and the way he handles it. He was the best actor/singer Hollywood ever had (and needs more like him!!!!), and this is certainly his best movie.

There are dozens of great Danny Kaye movies, but Secret Life of Walter Mitty to me is the best. Some Kaye movies get a little overdone with either him doing his nutty acts or with long musical pieces (which are good but sometimes there's just too much of it), but Secret LIfe has neither of these to deter from his great acting or the fun sub-plot of him trying to prove his theory about the bad guys who are trying to kill him. This movie is fun, fun, fun. I had an impossible time trying to find a DVD of this movie, and I finally settled on a Korean import purchased through Amazon. I was hesitant about this version, but to my surprise the DVD is perfect. I think Korean subtitles appear by default, but they're easily turned off. I understand one reason this movie is not available on DVD is because a remake is planned for 2012, so obviously a reissue will appear to promote the new movie. And just what we don't need: Another terrible remake of a classic film.

If this can happen to me, a freshman, it can happen to you. "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" is one great movie that I suggest every cynical person out there should sit down and watch. Mr. Kaye is hillarious and he'll make you a believer. I never thought that anyone was as funny as Ryan Stiles (one of my favorite actors), as talented as Mark Hamill (another favorite), and as lovable as Michael J. Fox (another favorite). The best number in this movie is...well, which could I choose from? I'd have to say that the scene where Mr. Kaye is imitating an old teacher of his. It got my class laughing...tell your kids to watch this movie. The younger ones may not get it, but you should still let them watch it. To this day, every time I read my Walter Mitty story in my reading book, I always think of my research teacher saying, "So, how's Walter Mitty doing?" I have to get this movie for my friends to see!

Purchased this so my husband could see it; I am always saying, "Oh, they are just a Walter Mitty!" He had no idea what I meant. NOW HE DOES. If Danny would have done less of his singing in this movie, it would have been better. I felt that got silly (even when I was a child and saw it the first time, I felt that way). The story is a good one and the acting in the movie is good too.

The VHS tape arrived so quickly, I couldn't believe it! Excellent condition too.