HotToastyRag Doris Day and her two sisters all fall for composer Gig Young in Young at Heart. However, even though his last name is featured in the title, Gig Young isn't the male lead. Doris wins out over her sisters, and she and Gig become engaged. In walks Frank Sinatra. He's Gig's musical arranger, and when he visits the family to help with some music, he clashes with Doris. She's sunshine and daisies; he's a dark raincloud. They bicker and banter as he tries to impart his cynical wisdom and she tries to brighten his outlook. I think you can guess what happens next.Ethel Barrymore, Dorothy Malone, and Robert Keith make up the adult family chaperones—would you leave your three daughters alone in the house with two strange men?—and a variety of composers contribute to the songs Frankie and Doris sing, although not every one was written for the film. "One for My Baby (And One More for the Road)", "Someone to Watch Over Me", "Just One of Those Things", and of course the title song, are performed in the movie. While some scenes are cute, I found an equal number of scenes to be depressing. In real life, we've all found it tempting to try and cheer up a perpetually grumpy person, but in a movie, it's a little tiring. Yes, it's Frank Sinatra so we want to forgive him, but who really wants to see Doris "Ms. Sunshine" Day struggle so much to make him smile?

calvinnme ... and as a result, through the years, I've just remembered it fondly. This film is a remake of 1938's Four Daughters which had Priscilla Lane in Doris Day's part and John Garfield in Frank Sinatra's part as the morose pessimistic musician who believes if not for bad luck he'd have none at all. This one has not been televised in years because the elements are apparently in shabby shape and need restoration. MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD. The film follows the plot of "Four Daughters" pretty closely, with Laurie (Doris Day) eloping with melancholy Barney Sloan (Frank Sinatra) in order to clear the way so that the man she really loved and was planning to marry (Gig Young as Alex) might fall in love with older sister Amy. Laurie decides to do this after she realizes Amy is in love with Alex.These attempts at manipulations of the heart seldom work out well, and such is the case here. Instead, Amy starts to see her long-time beau - who has always loved her - as the man for her precisely because of the way he takes charge of the chaos at the wedding after it has been discovered that Laurie has eloped with someone other than the intended groom. Thus Amy becomes engaged to her boyfriend, Alex is left unattached, Laurie is unhappy and trying to make the best of a bad situation, and her actual new husband Barnie is left feeling more like a failure than ever because he just knows he was second best plus now he feels like his bad luck is being imposed on his wife as well as himself.Where Young at Heart truly splits from Four Daughters is the ending. Barnie attempts suicide just like in Four Daughters, but Amy brings him back from the brink of death by telling him she really loves him plus one other secret which I'll leave as a surprise if you ever get a chance to see this movie. Another odd departure - there are only three daughters in this film, not four as in the original.

Neil Doyle FRANK SINATRA followed up his "From Here To Eternity" triumph by starring opposite DORIS DAY in a musical remake of "Four Daughters" called YOUNG AT HEART. He gets even better song material than Day, including memorable versions of "Young at Heart" and "One for My Baby", but Day is compensated by a nice dramatic role that gets her brand of warmth and sincerity, as well as a duet with Sinatra on "You, My Love".ETHEL BARRYMORE is the elderly aunt and ROBERT KEITH is the father, while GIG YOUNG plays the young man that Day almost marries until she discovers that her sister is broken-hearted over their upcoming marriage. Instead, she runs off with the loner, Barny (Sinatra), and has a rather tumultuous marriage that she's determined to salvage. This version of the tale has her succeed, avoiding the downbeat ending of the original in which the John Garfield character (played by Sinatra)died.It's pleasant, nostalgic and the kind of musical they never make any more. Particularly sensitive performances from Sinatra, Day and Gig Young under Gordon Douglas' direction. Worth seeing for fans of Day and Sinatra especially.The only big difference between this and the original is that color and music have been added. Otherwise, the script is pretty close to the 1938 version directed by Michael Curtiz.

writers_reign In musical terms this is, in many ways, two separate films; in one we have Doris Day singing the kind of sunny, feel-good songs she was recording successfully at that time - the mid fifties - and in the second we have Sinatra singing songs for Adults - with one exception 'standards' - as only he can. The story itself is, of course, our old friend the catalyst or what happens when an outsider is obliged by circumstances to join, usually temporarily, an existing social fabric and test its tolerance. In some ways this is a remarkably accurate musical version of Fannie Hurst's old potboiler 'Four Daughters' which back in 1938 introduced John Garfield to Hollywood. Fresh from the Group Theatre and weaned on Clifford Odets' machine-gun vitriolic dialogue Garfield had much the same impact on Hollywood and moviegoers as his character did on the all-American family headed by Claude Rains. For the remake Warners dropped one of the daughters, switched the locale to New England and turned Sinatra loose on father Robert Keith, aunt Ethel Barrymore and sisters Doris Day, Elisabeth Fraser and Dorothy Malone. If you watch Four Daughters immediately before Young At Heart you will hear that much of the dialogue - especially that originally spoken by Garfield - has been retained. Okay, it's a meller through and through but all hands are on the top of their game and Sinatra has seldom sung better on screen. The fact that he doesn't appear for a good half hour merely adds to the feeling of two separate films because we've had that half hour to adjust to the 'homeliness' of the Tuttles and Doris Day has laid most of her 'cute' songs on us so that the whole effect is to lull us into cosy expectation of a 'nice' movie and then Sinatra explodes into the frame and hijacks the movie. This is one to see again and again.