Very Cool!!!

Simply A Masterpiece

Let's be realistic.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Even if we take the cynical approach and say that Alexander Hall's "My Sister Eileen" is another fish-out-of-water movie, you can't deny that it's one enjoyable piece of work. The Eileen of the title is a bubbly young woman played by Janet Blair, with Rosalind Russell (in an Academy Award-nominated performance) as her irascible sister Ruth. The two of them move to New York to seek their fortune, only to experience all manner of unpleasant things. Whether it's an apartment visited by practically everyone, or confrontations with a publisher, there's bound to be more than a few Marx Brothers-style occurrences!I understand that the movie is based on a play, which is itself based on Ruth McKenney's memoirs of moving to New York with her sister. I figure that their experiences probably weren't as funny as what the movie, but you know what they say: comedy is tragedy plus timing. This is the textbook definition of a comedy classic. True, a lot of the material will seem dated - Rosalind Russell's and Janet Blair's clothes and hairdos just scream 1940s - but we can overlook that. This is one that you gotta see!Watch for a young George Tobias (Abner Kravitz on "Bewitched") as the landlord.

Those lyrics from the 1953 Broadway musical version of the play and this film version echo through my head as I watched this again. Rosalind Russell repeated her character in that musical as the Columbus Ohio writer Ruth Sherwood who comes to the Big Apple to make it in the magazine business. She turns lack of success in the city that never sleeps into a delightful farce, whether through the lunatic landlord she rents from, the professional football player she and sister Eileen allow to sleep on their kitchen floor, a fortune teller who seems to do more for business than read tea leaves, and a slew of Portugese sailors on leave who follow Ruth home and involve Eileen in an international incident involving a conga line. With these and other weirdos, she's got enough material for a dozen articles...at least.Unlike the later two musical versions, this film features appearances by Ruth and Eileen's square papa (Grant Mitchell) and delightfully lively grandma (Elizabeth Patterson) who have totally different opinions about these two unattached ladies heading to "sin city". Patterson gets some great lines, showing that not all non-New Yorkers are as babbity and provincial as Ruth suggested through Adolph Green and Betty Comden's later lyrics. Russell shines in her comic performance, whether making a funny face behind the back of an unwelcome guest or dealing with the fact that the sailors who followed her home loose complete interest the moment they spot Eileen.Janet Blair adds a touch of "unawareness" to Eileen's lack of conceit. Check out her reaction to the sudden replacement chosen to take her role of "A Doll's House" at the Columbus Little Players, another addition not seen in other versions on stage or screen, or in the TV version of "Wonderful Town".Russell's career devoted women were a mixed bag with "My Sister Eileen" a stand-out of the multitude of these projects. Russll's Ruth is attractive enough to turn men's eyes (until they see Eileen), although her comical no-nonsense attitude might scare some of them off. Here, she's a lot closer to her future role of Mame Dennis, albeit one amusingly perplexed by the wacky circumstances she finds herself in.The supporting cast shines, particularly George Tobias as the shady Appopolous. Brian Aherne's Robert Baker has some great singular moments that stand out, proving that while this may be about "My" (Ruth) and Eileen, it is without a doubt an ensemble piece, and a smartly written one at that.

Rosalind Russell and Janet Blair are the Sherwood sisters, who come to New York City to seek their fortune in "My Sister Eileen," a 1942 film directed by Alexander Hall. "My Sister Eileen" was originally a novel by Ruth McKinney that was made into a Broadway play by George S. Kaufman and starring Shirley Booth, later a Broadway musical (also starring Rosalind Russell) called "Wonderful Town," and then a different musical film, again called "My Sister Eileen." Finally, it was a TV series. I guess Broadway and Hollywood got some mileage out of the novel.The story concerns two sisters from Ohio who wind up living in Greenwich Village on Barrow Street. Ruth needed to leave Ohio; her rave review of her sister Eileen's performance in "A Doll's House" was published, but Eileen didn't play the role that night. The apartment has a few problems, one of which is the nearby subway, another is people who talk to them through the drapeless basement window, and another is the people that either follow the pretty, vivacious Eileen or whom she brings home. Finally, it looks as if Ruth gets a break when the editor of the Manhattaner, Bob Baker (Brian Aherne), likes her writing.This is a really sweet comedy, and having lived in the Village for 30 years, I always enjoy a film that's set there. The best scene is the conga line with the sailors, in an attempt to get them out of the apartment.Rosalind Russell's wonderful comedic skills and dry delivery work beautifully here, and when she appeared in the same role in "Wonderful Town," her reviews were sensational, and she won the 1953 Tony award. Once the '40s hit, she played smart, independent women; in the '30s, she did everything, including a few Garbo-esque turns. As the innocent man magnet Eileen, Janet Blair is very good, though I admit to liking Janet Leigh in the musical version better. Richard Quine repeats his Broadway role here, and he later directed the 1955 musical film. George Tobias is the girls' conniving landlord.Fun movie, set in a time when you could get an apartment in New York City for $35-40 a month!

Though this appears to have been filmed entirely on a sound stage, the feel of the original stories comes through. This is the Village as it has been as long as I've lived here.Please note: I was not born when this movie came out. But maybe my mother, a writer, saw it and decided ti was for her. When I was a child we lived a few blocks from where the stories were set. And for the last decades, I have lived maybe three blocks from there. And how it has changed! And how much for the worse: Rich people, high rents and buying (who'd heard of buying an apartment in 1942?!) Noisy clubs ...Janet Blair is fine as the title character. Rosalind Russell is very good as her sister Ruth. (The real Ruth, who wrote the stories, married Nathanael West and died tragically at a young age.) Russell is sort of like her Sylvia Fowler character in "The Women." But we can see hints of the broad style that was to come and was to sink her by the time of "Auntie Mame." George Tobias is fun as the girls' fast-talking artistic landlord. Without knowing it at the time, I rented my first Manhattan apartment from the man on whom this character was based. That was 30 years later.Brian Ahern is OK as the male lead. He's a little stuffy, but he's meant to be. In fact, his character is insufferable. Why Ruth is drawn to him is not made clear.I loved seeing the organ grinder near the end. I remember them on nearby Waverly Place a decade later when I was a small child! This gives a better view of the Village than any other commercial movie I can think of. It's fun and definitely is recommended..