I’m not certain, but I believe ROAD TO HONG KONG is the only one of the Road movies I hadn’t seen . . . until now. It’s the last of the series, and I remember when it played at the Eagle Drive-In in 1962, and of course it was on television many, many times when I was growing up, but somehow I’d never watched it. But I’m a big fan of Bob Hope and Bing Crosby and finally got around to it.
In this one, they play a couple of con men in the Far East, and through a
series of screwball circumstances, including mistaken identities and amnesia,
Hope’s character winds up memorizing a rocket fuel formula stolen from the
Russians by a sinister organization known as the Third Echelon. The rest of the
movie is one misadventure after another as the bad guys try to get the formula
from Hope. The fanatical leader of the group is played by Robert Morley, and
one of their agents is Joan Collins. Hope and Crosby wind up getting sent into
space not once but twice. They could have called this one ROAD TO THE MOON.
Anyway, after a lot of fairly mild hijinks, everything works out and the world
is saved from the bad guys, although the final fate of our not-so-intrepid duo
is left in the air a little.
It’s been so long since I’ve seen the rest of the Road movies that I can’t say
for sure, but I have a hunch that this is the weakest of them. The script by
director Norman Panama and producer Melvin Frank produces some smiles but not
many actual laughs. Still, I’ll watch and enjoy Hope and Crosby in just about
anything, and it’s fun watching them work to make something out of not much. As
usual, the best moments are probably when they break the fourth wall and talk
to the audience. There are some amusing cameos by Peter Sellers, David Niven,
Pat O’Brien, Frank Sinatra, and Dean Martin. Dorothy L’Amour shows up for one
fairly long scene and demonstrates how much the rest of the movie misses her.
Probably the most interesting angle about the whole film is how much it plays
like a James Bond movie at times . . . and when it came out, there had been
only one James Bond movie released, DR. NO. So oddly enough, ROAD TO HONG KONG
may be the first movie to try to cash in on what became the secret agent boom
of the Sixties.
If I had seen this movie at the Eagle when I was nine years old, I would have
loved it. Some of the more risque dialogue would have gone over my head, but it
has enough physical comedy and classic bits that I would have thought it was
hilarious. I don’t want to criticize it too much now, because I actually did
enjoy it quite a bit, but I think some of that was because of its nostalgia
value. Still, that’s a perfectly good reason for watching a movie. I’m glad I
finally got around to ROAD TO HONG KONG. I liked it enough I might even watch
some of the earlier ones.
4 comments:
In The Paleface, Bob Hope is mistaken for a hero (Jane Russell actually saved everybody) and he's cheered by the townfolk and Hope laps up the adoration without the slightest bit of shame. Then he says with a totally baseless confidence that only Bob Hope could make charming, "I wonder what the cowards are doing."
That line is stuck in my head like a pop song. It always makes me laugh whenever I think of it.
I will have to watch more of those Road movies.
Actually this came out half a year or so before Dr. No, both in 1962. It may feel like a Bond movie in part because the art director, Sid Cain, would work on the Bonds. Bob Hope's next, Call Me Bwana, which did come out after Dr. No, certainly ought to feel like a Bond. It was produced by Broccoli and Saltzman, co-written by Joanna Harwood of Dr. No, art directed by Cain, edited by Peter Hunt, with special effects by John Stears, and music by Monty Norman. In the next Bond, From Russia with Love, where an assassin escapes through the mouth of a star on a movie poster, they updated Ian Fleming's Marilyn Monroe poster into one of Anita Ekberg in Call Me Bwana.
I read where there was supposed to be another Road movie, but for various reasons, it was never made.
Fun Fact:
Bob Hope's character is named 'Chester Babcock', which as it happens is the birth name of Jimmy Van Heusen, who collaborated with Sammy Cahn on the movie's songs.
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