BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

Helllins It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Billie Morin This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

vincentlynch-moonoi For the most part, Bob Hopes best movie roles were in his crisp comedies of the 1940s, including (but not limited to) the Road pictures. Then he did a series of slightly more serious comedy films in the 1950s and this one from 1960s, before he made quite a few rather inane comedies where -- at his age -- he thought he could still be a romantic screen star, albeit a comedy one. For my money, this is Bob Hope's last really good film, followed by a baker's dozen dumb movies.And, this film is quite good. It's not a laugh out loud comedy. More a romantic serio-comic outing, and it may surprise many, but both Hope and Lucille Ball show their serious acting chops here (she was nominated for a Golden Globe). There's great chemistry between Hope and Ball. And the supporting cast -- Ruth Hussey, Don DeFore, Philip Ober, and (believe it or not a restrained) Louis Nye do nicely, too, although this film belong solely to Hope and Ball.As to the plot, it's somewhat realistic. A man and woman, both married and in the same social group, are drawn together and have a rather low-key fling. While there is humor in many of the situations, this is probably a bit more on the dramatic side overall.I was a little disappointed at first that this 1960 film was in black and white, but the print I watched on TCM was in excellent condition and it seemed like quality cinematography.If you're expecting this to be a laugh-out-loud film, you'll be disappointed. But the films value is in solid acting by the two stars and an overall realistic script. Recommended.

MartinHafer I have seen a bunch of Bob Hope films, though few from the later part of his movie career. This is because all the Hope films from the 60s that I have seen (especially "Boy, Did I Get a Wrong Number") have been disappointments. Despite this, I decided to try "The Facts of Life"...and was very much surprised. The big surprise is that the film really wasn't a comedy!!Larry (Hope) and Kitty (Lucille Ball) both hang in the same social circle but are hardly friends. She thinks he's a bit of a blowhard. Despite this, neither one realizes that they DO have something in common...inattentive spouses who take them for granted. This becomes obvious when these couples are headed to Mexico for a grand vacation. This is because Kitty and Larry's spouses both have something seemingly better to do and instruct their partners to go without them. In essence Larry and Kitty are pushed together and nature takes its course...and they slowly find themselves falling in love. Well, this made for a lovely vacation for the two but they both realize that it just cannot be and plan on returning home to their old dull lives. The problem is that when they return home, their spouses continue to find lots of things which are more important than nurturing them. So, the pair decide to pick up where they left off...though complications naturally ensue.If this doesn't sound like a comedy, well, it really isn't...at least the first half of the film. There are a few mildly funny bits here and there but it's obvious these folks weren't trying to make a comedy but more a romantic drama about marriage and straying spouses. However, when the pair finally get off together once again, the romance becomes far less romantic and the emphasis is on laughs AND reality...the reality that it was just a vacation infatuation after all and an affair ain't so easy after all.In many ways, this film would be great for couples to watch...particularly folks who have been together for many years. It's a great object lesson about what NOT to do in your marriage as well as to encourage you to keep that love alive.

jhkp A sort of Southern California version of Brief Encounter, reinvented to suit Bob Hope and Lucille Ball, who play married (but not to each other) Pasadena country club types who find themselves on an Acapulco vacation without their spouses - and fall in love. Lucille Ball plays Kitty very well and without undue sentiment. This is a type of character you may not have seen her play before. It's her performance that draws you into the story and makes you care. Bob Hope, as Larry, isn't really in Ball's league, as far as dramatic acting goes. He was never an emotional actor. But Norman Panama and Melvin Frank (who wrote for him so many other times), do something brilliant. They make his character a frustrated amateur comic. A wannabe Bob Hope, if you will. So that he can, in a sense, play himself. And it works.Overall, there are some missed opportunities for a really sharp comedy such as Billy Wilder might have made. But Panama and Frank are experts at writing funny yet entirely natural dialogue, and creating realistic characters and situations. The black and white film also features Philip Ober (Vivian Vance's husband, at the time), and in the smallish but important roles of the spouses, Ruth Hussey and Don DeFore.

theowinthrop After Bob Hope made THAT CERTAIN FEELING the general trend of his films as far as being worthy of the talent he had and of the best of his work was gone. In the future would be films like CANCEL MY RESERVATION. There was one more film with Bing and Dorothy Lamour, THE ROAD TO HONG KONG, but even that film was below par for the series (one wonders what the proposed final "Road" film - THE ROAD TO TOMORROW - would have been like). There was, however, this film...again not quite the film with Hope that one expected, but sturdy because of the support he shared with his leading lady, Lucille Ball.THE FACTS OF LIFE is the story of two people who share a midlife crisis. Hope is married to Ruth Hussey and Ball is married to Don DeFore. Both have children, and both seem reasonably well settled in their marriages (Ball's sole reason for complaining about DeFore is his gambling habits). Both couples are in the upper middle class of 1960 suburban America, belonging to the local country club, and going on shared vacations with their best friends. A trip is planned to Acupulco but Hussey stays home to take care of her ailing son, and DeFore is forced by his boss to take over operations of the San Francisco office after the person there is injured in a car accident. So Hope and Ball travel with Philip Ober and his wife to Mexico. But the latter two get what appears to be Montezuma's Revenge, and Hope and Ball are thrown together to try to salvage the vacation. Although they have occasionally been caustic about each other, they find they really get along quite nicely. In fact, after Ball lands a huge Marlin fish with Hope's assistance, and go touring the town, they find they really like each other. And a small affair begins.What follows is Hope and Ball trying to keep their raging/aging hormones in check, and yet still occasionally get together. This includes two funny sequences at a drive-in theater, and later Hope desperately trying to remember which roadside motel he left Ball in after a dinner dance. Finally they decide to take advantage of the Christmas holidays to make some plans. Will Ball leave DeFore for Hope, or will they find they can't shake responsibilities that come from being middle aged?Hope is not totally subdued in this film. At the start he actually is playing a scene in a familiar role: he is the master of ceremonies at a country club dinner. His comments regarding winning sportsman Louis Nye are sharp ones. So are his attempts to speed a cub scout meeting he has to chair (he wants to get together with Ball) but he is forced to listen to one of the scouts read a long, dull report about smoke signals. Ball is also good, particularly towards the end when she starts lecturing Hope about how much better DeFore is as a mechanic. The rest of the cast is good, DeFore dismissing his gambling habit (he plays craps downstairs during the opening awards dinner, and thinks nothing about losing $200.00). Nye is fun as a philandering husband with a trusting, nitwit wife. On the whole the film is quite adult in its point of view, and may be the last really good film that Hope made in his career in movies.