After the Paris aftermath we needed something seriously escapist, and I turned to my humane directors (the other two latter-day examples being Cameron and Wes) and found this absolute proof that movies are good medicine. Do people realise how smoothly and skilfully this film is made also? It's heart is of course in Hawks - not just Bringing Up Baby (the way she calls him 'Steve' is for example straight out of To Have and Have Not) but also references sources as diverse as silent movies (firemen as Keystone Cops) and Billy Wilder (use of Larabie name for one thing is no coincidence).
Streisand and O'Neal are wonderfully watchable and there's the treat of an Austin Pendleton for those in the know.
Also, you don't realise quite how wonderfully Laszlo Kovacs has filmed it (which, I think, is one of his distinctive - or rather, indistinctive - trademarks).
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