BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

SunnyHello Nice effects though.

Console best movie i've ever seen.

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

ofpsmith Father Goose is a great film, with a great story, great characters, and great actors. Walter Eckland (Cary Grant) is a man who ran away from society on a boat. He is pretty much aimless and does almost nothing for anyone else's benefit. But during World War 2 Royal Australian Navy Commander Frank Houghton (Trevor Howard) pushes Walter to become a watchman on a desolate pacific island so he just searches for Japanese planes. One day he comes across Catherine Freneau (Leslie Caron) a snobby school teacher and all of her female pupils who inadvertently end up on Walter's island. The writing in this movie is great. All of the characters are fantastic, Walter, Catherine, Commander Houghton are all enjoyable. And all the acting is stellar from top to bottom. I can definitely recommend this movie. You will not be disappointed.

tigerized No, it's not a high budget, CG intensive, action packed blockbuster. It's half a century old, contains no vulgarities or explicit scenes, no gore, very little gunfire, and only two decent explosions at the very end. (Sorry.) I do believe, however, that Father Goose is everything it was intended to be, and more. It's become a staple of regular viewing over the years in our household, to the point where bits of dialog are quoted frequently as perfect rejoinders. Even our kids say "All of them, Frank" when asked a question where a quantity or amount is the logical answer. (In more adult settings, "my coconut is empty" is more frequently employed.) For a film to work its way into the subconscious like this means the viewer has found something to cherish and commit to memory, and pull out with some glee whenever the situation warrants. Of course, this effort is wasted on those who haven't viewed the film. Fortunately, this is easily corrected.Cary Grant is the perfect reclusive curmudgeon who only wants to be left alone to pursue his dual pastimes of cruising the South Pacific and drinking. Leslie Caron is his ideal opposite, a school mistress stranded with her young charges on a remote island facing Japanese invasion. In spite of the mutual hostility, the story of them finding common ground to keep the girls safe is hilarious and heart warming, especially when framed by the harsh realities of World War II in the South Pacific.Produced at a time before filmmakers were constrained by political correctness in scripting and casting, Father Goose contains no overt or even subtle societal or political messages. In this regard, it's very refreshing to watch and enjoy. It contains enough suspense and clever dialog to keep adults engaged, and yet remains safe enough for family viewing. It's a romantic comedy that even guys and kids can enjoy, very well written and acted, and still holds up well even decades later.

chrsbrss I have lost count of how many times I have seen this movie. The first time I saw it was when I was an early teenager nearly thirty years ago with my Grandmother. (As a side note, I put a copy of this DVD in her casket when she passed away six years ago.) The movie has good clean humor, you never hear a swear word in the movie, even though you know that Walter Eckland swears like a drunk sailor, they use creative ways to get around it by innuendo as well as others.Grant's interaction with the children is great, especially with a young girl who refuses to talk, how he gets her to open up and speak is heart warming, and hilarious the way the child reacts to him.The movie is filled with humor from beginning to end, and regardless of your mood, you will always find yourself laughing at some point in the movie.

Robert J. Maxwell I know the plot sounds awful -- Cary Grant marooned on an island with Leslie Caron and half a dozen young girls -- but I found this pretty consistently funny. Of course you can predict just about everything that happens but it's so well written and the cast good enough that it should entertain most people.Grant is a grizzled, irritable, hard-drinking loner in New Guinea at the start of World War II and is finessed by the local Navy Commander, Trevor Howard, into manning a coast watcher station on an isolated island. Howard and his crew have buried bottles of whiskey around the thatch-roofed hut and arranged for the location of one bottle to be revealed with each confirmed sighting of Japanese aircraft or ships.Before long, circumstances force Grant to accommodate Caron and her diverse little charges -- two French, one Australian, and the rest British. There follow innumerable conflicts, small and large, as the unshaven, slovenly Grant is forced to sleep on his boat and does his best to avoid the kids, grumbling at their disruption of his unique life style and Weltanschaung.Largely because of Grant's superb comic timing and his expressive features and body language, the encounters are far more often funny than silly. Nor are they over-written. Example: While the others are out somewhere, Grant sneaks back into the hut to search for the whiskey that Caron has hidden from him -- again. One child has been left behind and she stares at him silently as he rummages through the junk. Balked, frustrated, he glances sideways at her, there is a lengthy pause, then he speaks: "Beat it." Example two: Believing Caron to have been fatally bitten by a venomous snake, Grant cuts the wound and sucks on it, then gets her drunk to make her death easier. Caron: "What did it taste like -- my blood." Grant: "How would I know? I'm not a vampire." Caron: "Was it salty?" Grant is nonplussed: "Well, a LITTLE salty." Caron: "OHH, was it TOO salty?" Grant (at his wit's end): "No -- it was JUST RIGHT." Caron sobs a little and says: "No, I know it was too salty." On the screen, with Cary Grant at his best and Caron doing a fine job, it's not nearly as ridiculous as it sounds. Grant delivers exactly the right measure of chagrin.It's not an important film, not enough to go on about, but it's largely effective and should keep the kids laughing as well as the adults. The alcohol abuse we see is genteel. Grant swigs it straight out of the bottle but it's good Black & White scotch and he's never drunk. He is naturally reformed at the end. He even drinks a non-alcoholic beverage at dinner. "Coconut milk. Mmmm. Young coconuts must love it."