The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker

For Pan & Scan, not the movie
This is a wonderful movie. Clifton Webb, as always, his usual terrific self. However, this movie was filmed in CinemaScope and Fox is releasing this in the pan & Scan version. Shame on you Fox. We are tired of being short-changed in this day and age of wide screen TVs. Warning - Do Not Buy these Pan & Scan DVDs.

Better than I expected
In Pennsylvania at the turn of the 20th century, a businessman (Clifton Webb) has successfully kept his two marriages and two families (with a total of 17 children) separate and a secret from each other. But when his Philadelphia son (Ray Stricklyn) unexpectedly visits the Harrisburg family looking for his father, the secret comes out and threatens to prevent the marriage of his daughter (Jill St. John) to the minister's (Larry Gates) son (Ron Ely, TV's TARZAN). Based on the play by Liam O'Brien, this wasn't quite the wholesome CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN knock off I was expecting. Although in the end it espouses traditional societal family values, it's a look at a so called unconventional "free thinker" and non-conformist who gets hoisted on his own petard with some laugh out loud moments. Webb, as expected, is able to deliver a quip with a razor like delivery but Dorothy McGuire as the first wife proves a feisty opponent. Directed by Henry Levin (JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH). With...

Clifton Webb the Cheerful Bigamist
For some reason, Clifton Webb was an actor Fox thought of first for movies involving fathers with big families. Maybe the success of SITTING PRETTY in 1948 led to him being given roles in which he could react comically with children. (MR SCOUTMASTER is another example where the kids were not his own). Knowing what we now know of Mr Webb's lifestyle, casting him as a father was clearly "casting against type", but then again so was casting Rock Hudson as a romantic lead. THE REMARKABLE MR PENNYPACKER was based on a Broadway play which in turn was based on a fictionalized biography of a member of a famous family of Pennsylvania which could boast a Civil War hero and a Governor.There is historical evidence of the Pennypacker who became a bigamist (a more common practise of yesteryear than we would like to think), but how much of this story is factual is hard to say. It is interesting that such a subject matter could be viewed as an ideal story for family entertainment, but '50's movies...

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