Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)

Purely Joyful Movie!

Nice effects though.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

There is a full sitcom environment when watching this movie, which makes the movie more funny and interesting. I like old movies, but I never thought I'd like it that much. It's a movie that makes me laugh and laugh.

Cary Grant believes he overplayed his character in 'Arsenic and Old Lace', and I agree, he's over-the-top. At times his frantic jumping around and shocked facial expressions are funny, such as when he tells his aunts early on that they really oughtn't to be poisoning their visitors by saying "Look, you can't do things like that! Now, I don't know how I can explain this to you, but it's not only against the law, its wrong! It's not a nice thing to do. People wouldn't understand. He wouldn't understand. What I mean is, well, this is developing into a very bad habit!" … all while hunched over and gesticulating. This is a loud movie, with one brother believing he's Teddy Roosevelt yelling 'Charge!' as he runs up the stairs and slams his bedroom door repeatedly, characters rapidly entering scenes in a pell-mell confusion of trying to hide bodies, threaten each other, commit others to mental institutions, etc etc. It's also all over the map. At first I thought Capra may have threaded the needle and been able to deliver both a dark comedy and a drama, since Raymond Massey's glowering and Peter Lorre's simpering are quite sinister, and a nice counterpart to Cary Grant and the sweet old ladies played so wonderfully by Josephine Hull and Jean Adair. However, the movie dragged on, and was far too long at 118 minutes. Some may like the madcap frenzy Capra created based on the stage play, and I have to say there are some nice moments and lines ("Insanity runs in my family. It practically gallops."), but overall the movie gets to be a little much, and doesn't stand the test of time, at least for me.

a crazy story. and a great cast. absurd events. and dark humor. and the complicity of viewer to crime. because two lovely aunts and the noble purpose who gives force to their gestures are axis of a chaotic, lovely story about love, family, web of secrets and a young man looking save situation. like many classic films, the flavor is the basic instrument to seduce. but not only. because it is a strange film noir and a wise expression of comedy. because the atmosphere of play remains but in the clothes of Frank Capra's comedy. nothing new. but original in a delicate manner because it mix the stories in inspired manner. so, one of films about old well known things in a nice manner. and the admirable couple Jean Adair - Josephine Hull.Cary Grant in middle of strong tempest. and the final as a form of sunrise. so, old flavors. memorable ones.

Over a drinking conversation, a friend asked me what was the darkest film ever made. Instinctively, I said Arsenic and Old Lace - a film I hadn't seen in over twenty years. My friend had never seen the film, and asked general questions about it. When I told him that it was a Frank Capra film he seemed incredulous. I guess he couldn't peg the director of Mr. Smith Goes To Washington with making a dark film.To tell the truth, neither could I - not on recall alone. That weekend, I plopped a borrowed copy into my DVD player, and watched the film again. After the first reel, which now seemed plodding, it all rushed back to me why this film was dark: It seemed that Mr. Capra had lost his naïveté, and filmed why he lost it.Mortimer Brewster (Cary Grant) is a famed drama critic for a New York paper. But mostly, he is known for his stance against marriage and the many books he has written mocking the institution. One Halloween, in which the Brooklyn Dodgers get into a real row of a fight, Mortimer and the love of his life - the girl next door, Elaine Harper (Priscilla Lane) - get married. Mortimer, fearing the deluge of negative comments of the famed bachelor tying the knot, brings Elaine by their folks' houses to announce their marriage before they sail away for a two-month voyage. It is here where Mortimer's life falls off the cliff. When he tells the kindly old Aunts that raised him, Abby (Josephine Hull) and Martha (Jean Adair) Brewster, the news, he discovers that the nicest people in Brooklyn have been putting arsenic in their homemade elderberry wine, and knocking off lonely old gentlemen. The news gets worse. It seems that Mortimer has repressed memories of the violence that was done to him by his brother, Jonathan Brewster (Raymond Massey), when he was a child. Plus, there is the delusional uncle who thinks he is Teddy Roosevelt. In all, after a half-hour, Mortimer now fears for Elaine's safety, for he believes he is as loony as the rest of the Brewsters.By the way, this is a comedy. It was adapted from a hit Broadway play starring Mr. Frankenstein himself, Boris Karloff. He actually was supposed to be in the movie also, but couldn't leave the play. Frank Capra directed Arsenic and Old Lace in the genre of the screwball comedies of the thirties. He shot it five months after the play premiered. He had previous success in the field of screwball comedies with It Happened One Night. Old Lace also could be considered a film noir piece with the abundant nighttime location shoots, and very dark interiors. The Brewster house provided for very ominous, long shadows. But if this was a noir film - I say it is - then it would be Capra's first. And the question would be "Why"?It was an obvious choice to cast Cary Grant, who had drawn crowds to several screwball comedies since his first screen role in She Done Him Wrong. In every one of these genre roles, he played the straight, sane one - the one who gets more insane as the plot progresses. (Of particular note, in later years, Grant held a very low opinion of both She Done Him Wrong and Arsenic and Old Lace. He found She Done Him Wrong and Mae West to be too sexual. And he found Arsenic and Old Lace to be too dark and cynical.) At the time of the play's release, America was in the beginnings of WWII. And maybe dark themes were all that could be tolerated by an entertainment seeking public. It and Sweeny Todd are definitely the darkest of the light theatrical subjects. And strangely enough both plays were released around American wars. Maybe funny comedies had to show a dark sense of humor. Or light musicals for that matter had to explore horror. Unlike Sweeny Todd the movie, Arsenic and Old Lace was a hit - mainly because it was shot within months after it opened, and released soon after it closed. By that time Europe was close to D-Day.