Bringing Up Baby

You might be curious as to why some people watch those creaky, boring, old black and white movies which you've purposely avoided all your life. If that's you, watch this and you'll understand.

If in the first ten seconds you're not already hooked then turn this off. You'll not do that though because straight away you are now in a happier mood. You're now best friends with Cary Grant's befuddled palaeontologist. You're instantly there in that absurd world of 1938. You're enjoying yourself.

If every 1930s film were a Led Zeppelin song, this would be STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN. This is the 1930s comedy which isn't just for fans of 1930s movies - it's as funny now as it was when it was written. Although it's clearly in a late 1930s setting with 30s stereotypes and 30s attitudes, it's also timeless inasmuch that you can so easily relate to the characters and their predicaments. As crazy as the situations get, everyone is also weirdly believable and real.

Everything is just right in this: Cary Grant has never been funnier Miss Hepburn's over-entitled Susan, someone constantly bemused by the concept of life having consequences is adorable. She's the perfect strong, eccentric 'Hawksian' woman so under Howard Hawks' direction she gives possibly the best performance of her career. Hawks, master of the gangster film and king of the Western emphatically proves he can do anything at all by also making the funniest film of the decade.