Father Is a Bachelor (1950)

Simply Perfect

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

"Father is a Bachelor" is one of those facilely sentimental films that deserves a swift kick in the butt. It's reminiscent of "Pennies from Heaven" a pretty bad Bing Crosby film. But it has some merit, despite being "wholesome".William Holden was Captain Cynic, a confirmed misanthrope; even his voice sounded world-weary and cynical, regardless of the role. This served him well in "Father Is a Bachelor", keeping the film from veering too far into sentimentality. (Had Bing Crosby starred (another reviewer notes the obvious possibility), it would have gone right over the cliff, bursting into flames before it crashed.)The story is set in the American South, though whether antebellum or postbellum isn't clear. (I assume the latter.) Five orphaned (and not-icky) children adopt him, and he has to go through the transformation from "I don't care about anyone but me" to "I'm willing to sacrifice for someone else's happiness". The change is played mostly seriously, and is almost believable.The story's strongest point is that Colleen Gray doesn't fall for Holden because he's good looking, but because she's convinced of his high character. (A similar transformation occurs with the town's plutocrat.) In other words, the story (sort-of) approximates a character-driven drama, rather than a plot-driven melodrama.The man driving the rich guy's carriage is Hank Worden, probably best-remembered as Mose Harper in "The Searchers".

Some people might think that William Holden was a bit miscast in this light-hearted comedy that doesn't feature laughs as much as smiles. This was before his rise from respectable actor with only two classics at that time ("Golden Boy" and "Our Town") under his belt. But with two of 1950's top rated films ("Born Yesterday" and "Sunset Boulevard") just down the road, he would be ranked a lot higher than he was throughout the 40's.The film's simple story is of a traveling medicine man (Charles Winninger) who ends up in jail for fraud, while his minstrel man (Holden) comes across five orphaned children and reluctantly takes on the job of being their papa. At first, he only breaks bread with them to get some greens to eat with the fish he has caught, but soon, is taken in by the sweet Mary Jane Saunders, the youngest of the children, all named after the first five months of the year. A concerned citizen (Colleen Gray) looks in on them and believes Holden to be their uncle. When Holden is forced to remain around after beating up a nasty local who insulted the children, he finds he has no choice to continue the facade. The town's shady lawyer (Clinton Sundberg) blackmails him into becoming engaged to one of his spinster sisters, but its obvious that the kids won't have anybody else but the lovely Ms. Gray for their newly found "uncle".There is nothing to criticize about this film other than its formulatic and predictable plot. The children aren't all sappy, and the songs are pleasant, if unremarkable. Everything is resolved nicely, something a growing cynical audience in 1950 wanted. Holden and Gray are a nice team, and Saunders is adorable without being an imitation of Shirley Temple or Margaret O"Brien. It won't win any awards, but that also means it won't be on any worst list either.

Father Is A Bachelor marked the end of what William Holden termed his 'Smiling Jim' roles. His next film would be for Paramount and would be Sunset Boulevard which forever changed his screen image. This film was done for his other studio master, Columbia.When it was decided that Columbia would have next call on his services for Father Is A Bachelor, Holden must have brought over the script from Paramount because if there ever was a Bing Crosby picture that Bing didn't do, this was it. This actually might have been a classic had Crosby done this over at Paramount.Bill Holden for the one and only time in a film sang although not with his voice. The voice of Buddy Clark who was one of the great radio singers back in the day and rival of Bing Crosby was the voice that Holden used. Holden/Clark sang about eight numbers all public domain stuff. Had it been done at Paramount Burke-Van Heusen or Livingston- Evans would have done an original score for Crosby.Buddy Clark was heard posthumously coming out of Bill Holden's mouth. He was killed in a private plane crash in the fall of 1949. Clark was also the singing voice of Jack Haley in Wake Up And Live and he had one of the most pleasant voices to listen to ever.The story has Holden singing in black-face the opening number in a medicine show run by Charles Winninger. One of the crowd recognizes Winninger as a guy who bilked a few customers a time or two before. Though the black-face is demeaning to black people it actually serves a purpose in the plot because after Holden has wiped off the burnt cork, no one recognizes him and he's free while Winninger is in the slam.But he doesn't stay free for long because the free and easy Holden gets involved with a family of five orphans who are trying to stay together and avoid an orphanage or being divided up with several families.Coleen Gray is Holden's love interest in this film, she's the daughter of Lloyd Corrigan the judge who Winninger is before. Stu Erwin is the sheriff and the orphans are Gary Gray, Billy Gray, Wayne Farlow, Warren Farlow, and Mary Jane Saunders. Sig Ruman has a nice part as the owner of a beer garden who employs Holden as a singing waiter. The biggest crisis in the film comes from the closest thing to a villain in the piece, sleazy lawyer Clinton Sundberg. He finds out that Holden is really no kin to those kids and he offers him a choice, marry one of old maid sisters either Peggy Converse or Lillian Bronson, either one doesn't make any difference to him. It's quite a pickle Holden's got himself in.Father Is A Bachelor is a nice family entertainment film, but it was also the kind of film Holden was trying to get out of doing and succeeded magnificently in his next work. Besides though Holden was good, he certainly was poaching on the territory of Der Bingle.

At the moment I'm watching "Father is a Bachelor" on TCM. I think it is a movie well worth issuing on DVD ... its audience potentially is great ... especially for those parents who would want their children to see an appealing film without gratuitous violence and sex as can be the case even in today's PG films. Who makes decisions about which films to reissue? I would like to find out. One person who previously commented mentioned the person who dubbed the singing. Both the singer and William Holden made it look very real, the singer by matching his vocal quality to Holden's speaking voice and Holden by perfectly matching his mouth and facial expressions to the music. A charming and sweet movie. Not the norm for this star, whose roles hardly ever involved children but were dramatic and sometimes violent. Then there are the children portrayed in the film ... not the pseudo-sophisticated worldly, overly made-up kids that today are often shown as far wiser than their parents. I can truly appreciate those qualities in a movie.