Review of Bringing Up Baby (1938) by Josh M — 20 Jul 2009

By all accounts the quintessential screwball comedy, I can't deny that Bringing Up Baby is completely hilarious as a comedy, and kept me laughing pretty hard throughout. And yet, something about the film rubbed me the wrong way.

I keep coming back to Hepburn's character, who's the prototypical Manic Pixie Dream Girl; she has no personality or motivation of her own, apart from setting up wacky situations and acting in a completely insane pattern.

There's nothing wrong with that from the point of view of a comedy - after all, isn't that basically what the Marx Brothers do so well? - but when you're trying to let your movie have a romantic relationship as well, it's problematic.

Bringing Up Baby wants to live in a gleefully insane universe and yet have us care about the romantic relationship, and I just didn't buy it at all. What's worse, I found her really irritating early on, and only more so as the film progressed; at times, it reminded me unpleasantly of Meet the Parents, as we were forced to watch a character be humiliated and miserable for ostensibly humorous purposes.

This is nowhere near as terrible as Meet the Parents - it's far too funny to even be considered - but the fact remains that Hepburn's character is so absurd and inconsistent that it got to be a little annoying.

I say all of this, but I really did enjoy the film, and I laughed a lot at it. I just wish it had either tossed the romance or toned down Hepburn.