What's Up, Doc? (1972) - Screwball comedy revived for a wonderful show

♥♥♥♥♥

Even the credits and poster work is brimming with spirit and right on the money for Peter Bogdanovich's What's Up, Doc?

Four highly important plaid overnight bags get mixed up in San Francisco around a musicologist doctor, who is in town with his fiancee Eunice to compete for a grant.

Barbra Streisand (Funny Girl (1968)) is the sprawling stranger who begins to impersonate the doctor's wife, hilariously played by master comedienne Madeline Kahn (Blazing Saddles (1974)). Ryan O'Neal (Barry Lyndon (1975)) is the very cute and confused Doc in the middle. Both Streisand and O'Neal look sweet as pie, and they also have great screen chemistry. They are sexy and funny in What's Up, Doc?, often at the same time.
But this is not merely a mix-up romcom, but also an homage to all the old, classic screwball comedies as made by Howard Hawks (Bringing Up Baby (1938)), Frank Capra (Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)), Preston Sturges (The Lady Eve (1941)) etc. in the high days of Old Hollywood. Gender-related mix-ups with gags of all kinds involved, it is a genre I have sometimes thought too silly to be really funny, but in great New York filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich's (Targets (1968)) able and very enthusiastic vision, I am laughing and rejoicing in the calamities again and again.
Great Hungarian cinematographer László Kovacs (Easy Rider (1969)) supplies great crips pictures, and Bogdanovich has cast an incredible supporting cast to one outrageously funny character after the other. It all concludes in a memorable and quite elaborate chase through San Francisco and then a court room scene that simply puts the capital H in Hilarity.
The Streisand character is especially cartoonish, deliberately, SPOILER and the film's ending pays appropriate homage to Warner Bros.' Looney Tunes.
What's Up, Doc? will make you laugh and make you happy and perhaps also a bit nostalgic. It is written by Buck Henry (Catch-22 (1970)), David Newman (Superman (1978)) and Robert Benton (Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)), based on Bogdanovich's story. It is one of my all-time favorite comedies and one that I can watch again and again and fall in love with all over every single time.
Bogdanovich is a somewhat under-appreciated American filmmaker and actor. He has made several good films, especially The Last Picture Show (1971), which, - on the other hand, - is an incredibly depressing film. He has also made many film documentaries, montages and books on filmmakers and actors. I just finished reading his Who the Hell's In It, which is an incredible joy to read for anyone who loves film and film stars. It features chapters on Bogdanovich's encounters/relationships with stars like John Wayne, Marlene Dietrich, James Stewart, James Cagney, Charlie Chaplin, Lillian Gish etc., including comments on their major achievements. - A great book from a great guy.

Related posts:

Peter Bogdanovich: Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel (2011) - Stapleton's Corman doc. is among the year's best films (interview subject) 
The Wild Angels (1966) - Young biker rebels deliver a counter-culture punch in Corman's hands (co-writer)

Watch the very unorthodox, unpretentious and funny trailer for the hilarious comedy, What's Up, Doc? here

Cost: 4 mil. $
Box office: 66 mil. $ + 3 mil. in 1973 re-run rentals (North America only)
= Mega-hit (returned at least 17.25 times the cost)
[What's Up, Doc? premiered 9 March (New York) and runs 94 minutes. It was shot in New Jersey and California, including Los Angeles and San Francisco, from August - December 1971. It became the 3rd highest grossing film of the year in North America, behind The Godfather and The Poseidon Adventure. The only international figure I have available is from Sweden, where the film was also a major hit with 1.1 mil. admissions there. The film's success closely tails the subsequent major hits Jaws (1975) and Star Wars: Episode VI - A New Hope (1977), said to have started the blockbuster term. The 1982 video release of the film garnered another 28.5 mil. $ in rentals. Bogdanovich returned with Paper Moon (1973). Streisand returned in Up the Sandbox (1972), O'Neal in The Thief Who Came to Dinner (1973). What's Up, Doc? is fresh at 90% with a 7.4/10 critical average on Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of What's Up, Doc??