A Masterpiece!

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

This one starts out rather silly. The premise is that a college girl is in love with a college boy who wants to go to Russia for two years. She doesn't want to force herself on him but her friends will do anything to get them together. At first the whole thing looks and feels ludicrous. The stereotypes of the black porters today are insulting. The women - Maureen O'Sullivan, Ruth Hussey, Ann Morriss, Joyce Compton, and Julie Bishop (here credited as Jacqueline Wells) - are all gorgeous of course, more like models than college girls. Lew Ayres plays the would-be wanderer and Burgess Meredith his friend in tow. Everybody is a bit too old for the parts but as the film progresses somehow this becomes irrelevant as the comedic elements begin to overshadow the shortcomings. The first to look out for is the gym scene where O'Sullivan coyly agrees with everything Ayres says while he tries to convince her (and himself) of the nobility of his plans. O'Sullivan floats around the gym in her trademark elfin way and you wonder how this poor man can resist her. Joyce Compton, as the ditsy blonde, has several moments such as her overt manipulation of the police chief. Also throughout the film Hussey's presence is elemental. She, perhaps more than O'Sullivan, contributes to its enjoyment. Her strong, wise-cracking portrayal makes you forget this is a terribly outdated sexist story and you begin to enjoy it for what it is: silly fun! One last scene to point out. The look on Ayres' face when he sees his car has been taken apart is priceless. Of course don't bother to ask how that was done with bare hands and in about ten minutes. That would spoil the magic.

Certainly some big, fun, familiar names in this MGM 67 minute shortie - a YOUNG Burgess Meredith, almost 30 years before he was the Penguin in Batman. I didn't really get him in the old black and white films. He and Lew Ayres were both about 30 by now, although they both look younger than that. Maureen O'Sullivan is "Alex", the heroine of our story, who is determined to drag her man to the spring dance. Sterling Holloway (was also the voice of Winnie the Pooh!) has about four lines in this one. The first half of the film is all about the girls and their antics as they lay out their plans for the dance. lots of giggling. In spite of all the great comedians with whom the director worked over the years, i found this one pretty bland and monotone. I'd recommend watching L. Ayres in "Holiday" instead; also from 1938... that one is 100 times funnier. I think they cast gave it their best, but had to work with a lame, whitewashed script. Might have been a little more interesting before the Hays Commission. The men take the women to Maloney's restaurant, and Sam (Ayres) tells Alex he is going to Russia, and can't attend the dance with her. Then the scheming starts.... Directed by Sylvan Simon, who had made a bunch of movies with Red Skelton, Abbott & Costello, and even Lucille Ball. Simon croaked at age 41... heart attack.

Although this film stars some good MGM talent and is a polished and pretty film to watch, it is at heart a piece of very forgettable fluff. About the only interesting aspect of this dopey film is the beginning, when Lew Ayers and Burgess Meredith are trying to get visas to go live in the USSR for two years! Now THAT is an unusual twist, but it also mirrors a fascination some idealistic college-age Americans had with an idealized notion of the Soviet Union (before the reality of Stalin's rule was well known). Apart from this interesting bit, the rest of the film is just dull and ridiculous. The film is set at a girls college where apparently the only expectation is for the ladies to find and marry a rich man--showing up on time or staying awake during classes is unimportant. And, while the male heroes of the movie attend Harvard, they plan on dropping out two weeks before graduation--now that makes a lot of sense. The gist of the film is this--Maureen O'Sullivan wants to marry Ayers but he is intent on going to Russia. That's it--the rest is just filler--and not particularly interesting filler at that.

A nonsensical 'B' movie that deals with a college romance, SPRING MADNESS is brighter and more entertaining than it has any right to be, and the reason is surely director S. Sylvan Simon. He seems to have been influenced by the buoyancy and overlapping wisecracks of STAGE DOOR the year before, and though the material and the actors here are not up to the level of that classic, this movie is great fun to watch.Though all of the cast look too old to be college kids, they pitch in with high spirits and manage to make it seem like they had a ball making this. Maureen O'Sullivan looks more beautiful than in anything else I've ever seen her in (including her TARZAN pictures), Lew Ayers and Burgess Meredith are skillful if not especially interesting, and Ruth Hussey delivers her sardonic dialog with delicious dryness. No one in this ensemble cast lets the team down, they all deliver. You couldn't be blamed for passing this by, but if you have the chance you should check it out. It shows what energy and ingenuity can do to perk up a routine script.