Bedtime Story (1964)

It's called Bedtime Story, and so it's a nice touch that the opening credits are done like a children's pop-up book. If you didn't know better, though, might you be led to believe that the movie would be a children's tale?

The movie even begins "Once upon a time." Perhaps the point is that Lawrence (David Nevin), a con artist, is a fanciful storyteller. And like all fairy tales, perhaps this intro puts us in the mindset of cautionary tale.

It's a much different opening than used in the remake Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988). And Marlon Brando as Freddy... quite different from Steve Martin. The overall story is more or less the same. Janet (Shirley Jones) is a much-simplified character, however, and this one difference makes some reviewers prefer Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. I would agree that I probably prefer the DRS ending, but the Bedtime story ending is pretty sweet, too, with some nice lines, such as Lawrence admitting that Freddy is likely happier, and that he, Lawrence, will suffer in comparison. Then, a beautiful blonde walks by, Lawrence's next mark, and he tells his police inspector friend with a smile that he will just have to get used to suffering.

Other than Janet's character and the ending, I guess what bothered me most, and it's a relatively minor complaint, is the use of rear projection for a few of the beach and water scenes. I can forgive the water scenes, but there wasn't any real reason they couldn't have shot the beach scenes at a real beach.

For the most part, the scenes and even the dialogue matched up in this and DRS, and since I just watched DRS, it felt like I had already watched this film... I might have enjoyed it more if I had watched each version with some interval of time in between viewings.

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