If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Goodbye, My Fancy (1951) ** 1/2 (out of 4)Rather bizarre and uneven mix of comedy and drama features congresswoman Agatha Reed (Joan Crawford) going back to her college to receive an honorary degree. Her main reason for wanting to go back is so she can see a former love (Robert Young) who she was expelled from school for sneaking out to see. Once back on campus she ends up caught between him and a photographer (Frank Lovejoy). GOODBYE, MY FANCY has pretty much been forgotten over the years and it's easy to see why because it's really not part of Crawford's high standards, which she started six years earlier with MILDRED PIERCE and followed with some very impressive bits of work. This film here is mildly entertaining on a few levels but overall you've got to consider it a pretty disappointing picture. One of the biggest problems is that it runs 106-minutes and probably could have lost a good sixteen-minutes if not more. I say this because there's just so much going on in this picture and with so much happening the film just seems too long and uneven. The early portion of the film makes you think that we're in for some sort of weird comedy and we're given various silly scenes. Then the film because a rather bland romantic-comedy but things change yet again when we get a rather long political debate about freedom. I think the final twenty-five minutes or so are actually the best part of the film as the Crawford character tries to fight to get a film shown that tells young people some of the horrors that are out there. As for Crawford, she turns in a good performance but there's certainly nothing all that memorable here. This is the type of role should could do without trying but it's always nice seeing her. Young is pretty bland in his role but thankfully Lovejoy adds some energy when he's on screen. Eve Arden is good as the secretary and Janice Rule is also nice as Young's daughter. GOODBYE, MY FANCY really isn't going to appeal to many except for Crawford fans wanting to see everything she did.

SHAWFAN has the issue correct. The problem is that he does not have a full sense of history. This movie was made in 1951, and there was constant pressure on the motion picture industry to tone down hints of "radicalism".Joan Crawford's attack on the right wing trustee for forsaking the education of these college age students with "entertaining" motion pictures; prevents the message of the film she has brought to campus.Simply, without images, the result of letting the National Socialists destroy education in Germany from 1933-1945, resulted in hanging and executions of the teachers.The trustee in question expressed that buildings were more important than a good education.Yes, there are those gooey moments. They are not there because the film story has a need for it, but rather that the various "approval" boards would have forced the filmmakers to put it in to water down the content.Robert Young's role proves that he is just a weak person. Not the person to stand up for what is right. Even his mealy mouth response to the film being shown AND THE STUDENT'S APPROVAL over everyone's objections prove that.BUT, run this film with two others, THIS LAND IS MINE (1943) and PEOPLE WILL TALK (1951). Then the message of what the film is about comes through like a bell.IN OUR DEMOCRACY EDUCATORS MUST BE BACKED. When cities, states and even your congress-persons yell, CUT EDUCATION SPENDING, these are just three films with which you can relate.peter22060 PS Truth through learning, and a focus on history, should make these three movies text material.

Goodbye My Fancy finds Joan Crawford taking over a role popularized by fellow film star Madeline Carroll on stage as a member of the House Of Representatives coming back to her former college to accept an honorary degree. She's invited by college president and former boyfriend Robert Young.There's a lot of history here and this is the only degree she'll have from the College Of New Hope for women located in rural New England. Back in the day apparently Crawford was a wild child, at least wild by those standards back then. She got into a compromising situation with Young and she took the fall by herself and got expelled for it. In the interim Young in addition to rising to the presidency of the college married a woman who died and has a daughter, Janice Rule, who is going to be one of the graduates at the ceremony Crawford gets her degree.Crawford went into journalism and then politics. She's combining the two at this point having produced a documentary about the current social problems of Europe and how Fascism by curtailing free speech contributed mightily to them. She's hoping to show the film while she's at the college. Her opponent in this endeavor is the chairman of the board Howard St. John who also happens to be now married to Crawford's former roommate Lurene Tuttle. He's got the part that actors like Eugene Palette and Charles Dingle normally were cast in, the arrogant, self righteous right wing blowhard who thinks he ought to be controlling the educational process. Not that he's against free speech mind you, but he feels that kids should not be exposed to this kind of serious work. He in fact donated the campus movie theater and he'd like for them to show entertainment that he approves of, such as his favorites Abbott&Costello.Young's dependent on St. John's good will for his job. But one who isn't and is also a rival for Crawford is Frank Lovejoy, a Time&Life war photographer who is covering this event. He'll expose Young's timidity if for no other reason than to shame him in front of Joan.Goodbye My Fancy was written by Fay Kanin and ran for 446 performances on Broadway during the 1948-49 season and was directed by Sam Wanamaker who also played the Frank Lovejoy part. The college president was played by another former movie name, Conrad Nagel. The play took home a Tony Award for Shirley Booth who played Crawford's Congressional aide and has some really funny Eve Arden type lines. When the film came out the Eve Arden part was played by Eve Arden.The play draws heavily on themes expressed in James Thurber's The Male Animal. If anything it's more serious here because whereas in The Male Animal, trustee Eugene Palette objected to the content in reading Nicolo Sacco's letter in class, St. John just objects to the idea of material that is mind challenging in the classroom in general. What does this imbecile think they're going to college for. In fact there's a minor role played by Morgan Farley as a physics professor who is intending to leave the college because of the limits he's being put under and Farley plays it well.Coming out as it did during the House Un-American Activities Committee days and after Joe McCarthy started finding Communists in all kinds of places, Goodbye My Fancy was quite the courageous project for Warner Brothers at the time. It's a timeless tribute to the value of free speech and the marketplace of ideas that a university is supposed to be.This is a film that I think needs a remake. Can you see some trustee on a university today throwing his weight around and maybe filling the campus cinema with reruns of Saturday Night Live in order that students not concentrate on serious issues?I think it could be done.

Ridiculous fluff, that compounds its error by trying to have meaning. Joan, this time as a congresswoman, Agatha Reed, chairwoman of a committee dedicated to "investigating the high cost of food." Says Congresswoman Reed, "The housewife has been getting it in the neck too long. I'm going to keep fighting long enough so that the American family can take a vacation once a year, see a movie every week and feed an occasional peanut to an elephant." She's all business, but becomes all gushy when she is awarded an honorary degree from Good Hope College, where she was expelled for the crime of having stayed out all night (the parallel to Joan's real life is unmistakable here, as it is in all Joan Movies). The degree causes much consternation on campus ("That would make it the most broad-minded institution in the history of education!") – but Joan is unaware of this as she arrives. The college president, Jim Merrill, played by Robert Young, at his handsomest, happens to be Joan's former teacher – and lover. It was with *him* that she spent the night out, all those years ago, but Joan felt it was better to just disappear rather than try and explain to the skeptical college that they were about to be married. Naturally, this high-profile event will be covered by *Life* magazine – and who does the photographer turn out to be? Yet another of Joan's old lovers – this one, she hung out with in China "during the war", and he thinks Joan might be headed for trouble with her old flame. Eve Arden, playing Joan's assistant, "Woodie," is at her butchest and most smart-alecky in this movie – with her flippant and unnecessary remarks that would make you dismiss her from her job, if you didn't like her so much. But you not only like Eve in this, as in all her roles, you adore her. She is so droll and no-nonsense, you'd like to pay her just to hang around and be one of the boys. When Joan cries upon arriving at her alma mater, Eve tells her it "looks fierce." But Joan says that maybe others only see a collection of buildings, she, Joan, sees youth – herself at 18 "eager, expectant – a little frightened, asking 'What is life? What am I?'" But, of course, if we actually go into depth about Joan at 18, the truth may be a little different. For me, this is the major problem in watching any Joan movie. You can call her characters whatever you want to, but it's always all Joan, all the time. So, since what we're always seeing is Joan being herself, it's easy to dispense with character's names. It's just that it gets confusing when Joan tries to tell us something patently untrue, like her description of herself at 18 – when we know that at 18, Joan had already been around the block several times. Many men would have described her as eager, and as far as being expectant, she had already had several abortions at this point. But that's a personal problem, and I digress, but I simply wanted to explain why I say things such as "…and then Joan does…" this or that, or "We see Joan as..." when we are not literally watching a home movie.There is an unintentionally hilarious moment in which Joan is given the Clara Bow doll that she left behind in college – quick arithmetic tells us that Joan and Clara were contemporaries and this is a transparent ploy to make us believe Joan is much younger than she actually looks. It fails. What also fails is an attempt at early-50s political correctness. In the story, Joan has written a book about free speech and made a film (no, not the one about the plumber), and she attracts the attention of an early 50s campus radical, Dr. Pitt, who is about to be fired for his views, which are shockingly similar to Joan's. This is where the movie mysteriously becomes a morality tale –a weak one, to be sure, but perhaps the only thing that keeps it from sliding into oblivion.