weezeralfalfa Shortly before "Anne Get Your Gun" was released, this film, which I dub "Betty, Get Your Gun" was released, as an often raucous western comedy, starring Betty Grable and Cesar Romero. But, sometimes the duo of Sterling Holloway and Dan Jackson, as the demented Basserman boys, take center stage. They have a penchant for spying on Betty, and acting up in her class or elsewhere. Porter Hall is perfect as the harried Judge O'Toole: the unlucky recipient of 3 bullets from Betty's gun, in a running gag sequence, that lodge in the least damaging place: his buttocks. Hugh Herbert is perfect as the eccentric doctor who pulls these slugs out. Rudy Vallee plays a dapper wealthy bachelor, who owns a gold mine, and competes with Cesar for Betty's heart. Cesar is a handsome rogue who has a love-hate relationship with Betty. .......During the credits, and at the end, the peppy title song is sung. Rather early on, onstage, Betty sings the melodious "Every Time I meet You", accompanied by a barbershop quartet. This was composed by Josef Myrow and Mack Gordon. Later, in a private setting, Rude Vallee, along with Betty, sing the standard "In the Gloming"......The silliness occasionally gets out of hand, but on the whole I liked it. See this short second feature film at YouTube.

writers_reign If I hadn't just seen his double-threat credit moments before this movie started I would have been hard put to identify it as the work of Preston Sturges. Adrift from both his home studio, Paramount, and his repertory company of actors he is indeed a shadow of his former self. True, they gave him the reigning (still just about) Queen of the Fox lot, Betty Grable, and solid support Cesar Romero, but it wasn't really enough and it's not hard to see why this effort did for his Hollywood career. There are touches of the old talent and it's possible that those who claim it a satirical triumph years ahead of its time may just have something of a point but it's equally easy to dismiss this one-trick pony of sharpshooter Grable missing intended target Romero - the boyfriend who done her wrong - and putting a slug in Porte Hall where it will do the most good as a wild turkey.

museumofdave I came onto this film as one of a large purchased collection, and after reading a batch of reviews on various film sites didn't expect much from it; there were numerous citings that it was perhaps Grable's worst film, that it wasn't vintage Sturges, that it was loud farce devoid of virtues except for an expert use of full Technicolor. And color it has, And it is a loud farce. But although it completely lacks the soft focus turn of the century costumer that Grable so often appeared it, and barely gives the viewer time to absorb the nutty humor, Beautiful Blonde, from it's initial scenes with Grandpa Russell Simpson teaching his little curly-haired granddaughter to reduce bottles to smithereens with a careful aim to the last mad gunfight, a loud and vulgar and often screamingly funny parody of dozens of final shoot-outs in hundreds of western hero epics, this film exudes a sense of madness, of a cast nearly out of control in the spirit of farce. One critic mentions how often Olga San Juan as "Conchita" the dark- skinned servant, is insulted—but failed to remark on her hilarious comebacks, a few surely cut off mid-sentence by censorship concerns. If a careful viewer listens carefully (often hard to do in this raucous unendingly noisy film), there are ample double-entendres as well as the beginnings of a limerick that rhymes with "Nantucket." Surely most alert viewers will fill in the blank. This film demands your attention, and if you do not have the patience for noise and chaos as part of your experience, you may actively dislike it. Grable seems to be having a great time, especially as the substitute teacher with a golden gun, confronted by a pair of demented youths out of some clueless Beavis-world, one an off-the-wall Sterling Holloway. And the film is certainly worth watching just to see so many familiar character actors taking full advantage of their few lines—whether it's Margaret Hamilton, Hugh Herbert or for a brief moment, Marie Windsor in full-on scarlet feather drag—the film is so short, so fast-paced, that co-star Cesar Romero almost seems insignificant, and seems to be plot window-dressing. Which he is!Of course this is no Palm Beach Story, that brilliant farce about romance and love and money: nor has it the zany coherence of The Miracle of Morgan's Creek. But it reflects the scattershot, nutty world that Sturges created so often, and seems like his final party before the silence descended--and you are invited.

mark.waltz and Betty Grable had "The Beautiful Blonde From Bashful Bend".While it is extremely difficult to dislike anything Betty Grable ever did, this film really cracks that rule. Every star has an embarrassing moment, and so does every director. In that case, here it is Preston Sturges who spoofs westerns with a crudeness that is sometimes nose-wrinkling as you try to figure out why they even thought this had a chance of being considered entertainment. It is obvious that someone was influenced by the Broadway success of "Annie, Get Your Gun!" (just imagine Grable in that role!), but that at least had good taste, an excellent Irving Berlin score, and stars like Merman and Betty Hutton to help vanish away the corn. What this film ranks is simply insulting.An elderly man is seen teaching a five year old girl how to shoot a gun after one of the weakest opening credits songs, certainly the first here (and followed by such gem title songs as the credits of "The First Traveling Saleslady" and "Oh, Dad, Poor Dad, Mama's Hung You in the Closet...") . You get the picture. This isn't Annie Oakley, Calamity Jane, or Molly Brown. This is an ill-tempered spitfire who grabs a gun first, shoots second, and apologizes third. In three of the cases of her temperament, a hissing judge (Porter Hall) ends up on the receiving end of her sharp-shooting. The first sequence has Hall (as a character named Alfalfa) being chastised by his nagging wife Elvira (Margaret Hamilton) for being caught in a lady's boudoir. After shooting the judge in the derrière (twice), Grable escapes to the middle of nowhere, and like Mae West in "My Little Chickadee", ends up teaching school. She deals with two over-aged class bullies (one played by Sterling Holloway) by shooting ink bottles off their heads in order to keep them in line. Her old lover (Cesar Romero) shows up to find her interested in prominent townsperson Rudy Vallee and of course, another rumpus is forthcoming.Grable only sings very briefly in this comedy misfire which takes satire too far and turns the country folk of this town into idiots who begin shoot-outs of their own when Holloway and his twin are believed to be killed. Such familiar character players as Hugh Herbert (as a near-sighted doctor), Al Bridge and the annoying El Brendel turn up, although something tells me they (like the others) wished they had turned it down. Olga San Juan suffers racial slurs as the half Mexican/half Native American companion of Grable's. The only really funny sequence are some gags during the final shoot-out (straight out of a 60's sitcom) and the brief exchange between Hamilton and Hall at the beginning. Fortunately short, this film is an albatross in the career of one of our most delightful musical comedy stars who probably knew better the next time to read the script before she consented to appear in her next projects.