I tend to find Bob Hope's solo efforts-- the ones without Bing Crosby-- a bit hit or miss. This early 50s effort misses the mark more than it should. The bosses at Paramount have provided a decent director (Norman Z. McLeod); a sizable budget; a lovely leading lady (Hedy Lamarr); and a roster of dependable costars. But something is off.
I think the main problem is that the gags are mostly uninspired, including one with Mr. Hope's character having to wear a girdle. And much of the dialogue is so inane in spots that all we can do is shrug and roll our eyes at the proceedings. It's not that Hope and company don't try, they certainly do. It's just that much of what ended up on screen isn't funny.
The initial set-up involves Hope as a vaudeville actor performing some contrived shtick at a burlesque house. He is apprehended by police because he shares a physical resemblance with a wanted spy. Why the police are in charge of this investigation and not the FBI is a mystery. The coppers shoot and wound the doppelgänger (also played by Hope). This requires Hope the vaudevillian to masquerade as the villain to foil an international plot that threatens U. S. security.
After he agrees to help, Hope flies to Tangier where he meets Miss Lamarr (in other pictures this would have been Miss Lamour). She's a gorgeous spy working for the other side, headed by criminal mastermind Francis L. Sullivan. We're never told who the other side really is. Only that there's going to be a transfer of microfiche with government secrets on it that Hope must intercept. As MacGuffins go it's a vague one.
Naturally, Hope's character falls for Lamarr though it takes two-thirds of the picture's running time for him to figure out she's in cahoots with the crooks. The last third of the story has her experience a change of heart and decide to save him from Sullivan and the other goons. She now realizes she loves the impostor, not the man she originally thought he was.
Not all of the hackneyed love story works. Lamarr and Hope exhibit no palpable chemistry as a screen couple. It seems obvious that while Hope finds luscious Lamarr an attractive dish, she's not into him the way she seems into most of her leading men. As a result, her performance is rather cool and detached, which goes against the denouement and happy ending the writers have plotted for her character.
The funniest sequence in the film involves a fire that occurs at Sullivan's villa. Lamarr rescues Hope in a stolen car and drives him into town, with henchmen on their tail. In town they duck into a building where a group of firemen are answering a call. Hope and Lamarr don firefighter outfits and hop on the truck with the men. They wind up back at Sullivan's place, to help put out the blaze. It's a bunch of silly nonsense.
MY FAVORITE SPY is the third film that Miss Lamarr made at Paramount when she signed a multi-picture deal after leaving MGM. The first was SAMSON AND DELILAH, her most successful picture, where she starred in a biblical epic directed by Cecil DeMille. The second assignment was COPPER CANYON, a John Farrow western in Technicolor that paired her with Ray Milland. Then finally, she made this farce with Bob Hope.
She had been stuck in a rut at Metro, typecast in vamp roles. While she's still playing an alluring woman in these later films, her assignments at Paramount provided the actress with more variety and the opportunity to try something different.
I think the main problem is that the gags are mostly uninspired, including one with Mr. Hope's character having to wear a girdle. And much of the dialogue is so inane in spots that all we can do is shrug and roll our eyes at the proceedings. It's not that Hope and company don't try, they certainly do. It's just that much of what ended up on screen isn't funny.
The initial set-up involves Hope as a vaudeville actor performing some contrived shtick at a burlesque house. He is apprehended by police because he shares a physical resemblance with a wanted spy. Why the police are in charge of this investigation and not the FBI is a mystery. The coppers shoot and wound the doppelgänger (also played by Hope). This requires Hope the vaudevillian to masquerade as the villain to foil an international plot that threatens U. S. security.
After he agrees to help, Hope flies to Tangier where he meets Miss Lamarr (in other pictures this would have been Miss Lamour). She's a gorgeous spy working for the other side, headed by criminal mastermind Francis L. Sullivan. We're never told who the other side really is. Only that there's going to be a transfer of microfiche with government secrets on it that Hope must intercept. As MacGuffins go it's a vague one.
Naturally, Hope's character falls for Lamarr though it takes two-thirds of the picture's running time for him to figure out she's in cahoots with the crooks. The last third of the story has her experience a change of heart and decide to save him from Sullivan and the other goons. She now realizes she loves the impostor, not the man she originally thought he was.
Not all of the hackneyed love story works. Lamarr and Hope exhibit no palpable chemistry as a screen couple. It seems obvious that while Hope finds luscious Lamarr an attractive dish, she's not into him the way she seems into most of her leading men. As a result, her performance is rather cool and detached, which goes against the denouement and happy ending the writers have plotted for her character.
The funniest sequence in the film involves a fire that occurs at Sullivan's villa. Lamarr rescues Hope in a stolen car and drives him into town, with henchmen on their tail. In town they duck into a building where a group of firemen are answering a call. Hope and Lamarr don firefighter outfits and hop on the truck with the men. They wind up back at Sullivan's place, to help put out the blaze. It's a bunch of silly nonsense.
MY FAVORITE SPY is the third film that Miss Lamarr made at Paramount when she signed a multi-picture deal after leaving MGM. The first was SAMSON AND DELILAH, her most successful picture, where she starred in a biblical epic directed by Cecil DeMille. The second assignment was COPPER CANYON, a John Farrow western in Technicolor that paired her with Ray Milland. Then finally, she made this farce with Bob Hope.
She had been stuck in a rut at Metro, typecast in vamp roles. While she's still playing an alluring woman in these later films, her assignments at Paramount provided the actress with more variety and the opportunity to try something different.