b rad’s review published on Letterboxd:
This is a film that despite being fairly frank and ahead of its time in terms of it's dealing with sex was a subject - Day calls Hudson a "sex maniac" at the start, and it's clear her character's underlying motivation is that she's desperate to get laid - the film is still pretty frustratingly conservative in its gender politics that haven't aged well. Hudson's character is sleeping with multiple women (and the film isn't very judgemental on this, and his effect on women is comically exaggerated) while she is the typical career-driven woman that we're supposed to want to be wooed by Hudson. Just another example of peddling the sort of bullshit concept that a good relationship will stop men from uncontrollably sleeping with everyone, and will be the first time a 'good' girl will sleep with someone. In this regard, I suppose its sort of insulting to both genders from today's perspective, until the last scene which as someone else wrote here, which is really offensive and cringe-inducing to watch.
The film as a whole is sort of fun though when you get past all of that. It's very reminiscent of what you'd see in a rom-com nowadays, of a guy having to pretend he's something he's not in order to make a girl fall in lover with him, and then (momentary) disaster when she finds out his real self, etc. It's interesting as a link between the rom-coms of the 30s and 40s with Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn etc and the scores of unremarkable ones from the last few decades.
Hudson is extremely charming, with maybe the most melting smile out of all actors. You wonder how much these films play with the irony of his sexuality despite being THE heartthrob of the era - there's a wonderful scene where over the phone, he teases and suggests to Day that the man she's seeing (himself) might be gay. When you realise that he was gay, and his lifetime close friend Day reportedly never knew that he was, it takes on a meta significance that is very amusing. It's not as tongue-in-cheek as his roles with Sirk in the same era, but it's fun. He's great here and while I don't really see the appeal of Day, she has good chemistry with him. However, the stars of the show are the supporting acts - Tony Randall is always a joy, and they should basically rename the Best Supporting Actress Oscar the "Thelma Ritter Award" - as always, she steals every scene she's in as the maid who constantly turns up drunk. There's a great scene at a bar where she drinks Hudson's character under the table. She's sorely underused, however, getting an Oscar nomination for what wouldn't amount to more than 2-3 minutes on screen. Still, her 2 minutes alone makes the movie worthwhile.
So it's a pretty fun, pretty charming rom-com that goes through the motions and has a certain elegance to it. However, it's visually a bit bland despite some nice sets and costumes but it has a conspicuous waste of Cinemascope - I mean this in the sense that there are heaps of shots with just blank wasted space on either side of the main action. I love that ridiculously wide aspect ratio as much as the next person, but nothing is done with it here and the amount of unused space in many shots is almost distracting. Not every director is going to have the painter's eye of a Preminger for mis-en-scene, but Cinemascope can expose some of the less visually interesting directors/DPs.
So, ok movie, but pure confection. Better than the stuff in the genre now and with some killer performances, but unremarkable. I'll check out the other Hudson-Day-Randall pictures, however.