Themes: Battle of the Sexes, Love Triangles, Otherwise Engaged
Main Cast: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Aldo Ray, Jim Backus, William Ching, Sammy White
Release Year: 1952
Country: US
Run Time: 95 minutes
MPAA Rating: NR
Plot
Pat (Katharine Hepburn), a college phys-ed instructor, enters into professional competition as a golf and tennis player. Mike (Spencer Tracy), a likeable but unscrupulous sports promoter, first attempts to bribe Pat to lose, but later becomes her manager. Pat performs brilliantly until her insufferable fiance Collier West (William Ching) shows up; West always manages to make Pat so nervous that she can't win to save her life. At long last, West walks out, having found Pat in a compromising situation with Mike. Though she'd previously kept her distance from Mike, Pat suddenly realizes that she's fallen in love with him and--after a few crooked gamblers are disposed of--Pat and Mike become partners on a permanent basis. Pat & Mike reunited Tracy and Hepburn with their favorite director, George Cukor, and their favorite scenarists, Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin. Watch for real-life golf and tennis champs Gussie Moran, Babe Didrickson Zaharias, Don Budge, Alice Marble, Frank Parker, Betty Hicks, Helen Dettweilerand Beverly Hanson as "themselves" -- and also keep an eye out for ex-ballplayer Chuck Connors, making his acting debut as a highway patrolman. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
This frothy Spencer Tracy/Katharine Hepburn vehicle makes perhaps the best use ever of the actress' athletic prowess. It also makes pretty great use of the offscreen couple's well-known onscreen chemistry, resulting in a delightful sports comedy that puts the emphasis on the laughs while also rendering the scenes of Hepburn putting and volleying enjoyable -- even to those who abhor athletics. With her brittle East Coast persona, it's hard to stomach Hepburn as a California outdoorswoman, but if you can forget verisimilitude (hey, maybe she's a transplant), then the picture's a lightweight winner. From the hilarious early scene where a flustered Hepburn tells off a matronly golf aficionado by spitting out insults and strutting her stuff on the driving range to the extended sequence where she transforms Tracy into a damsel in distress, Pat and Mike is full of first-rate humor that plays off the actors' images while also injecting some novelty into the formula. A by-the-books subplot involving gangsters at least drives the plot and provides some laughs; but Aldo Ray's character, a dim-witted boxer, was a dried-up joke even in 1952. Still, Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin provide a remarkably economical script that fits celebrity cameos, sports footage, slowly dawning romance, and feminist dignity into a short (by today's standards) 95 minutes. Director George Cukor impressively fuses romantic comedy briskness with sports journalism and slapstick, even veering off into a memorable scene that plays like a bad acid trip on the tennis court. Adam's Rib may be regarded as the zenith of the Hepburn/Tracy union, but Pat and Mike ranks up there, too. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
Chuck Connors - Police Captain; George Mathews - Spec Cauley; Loring Smith - Mr. Beminger; Phyllis Povah - Mrs. Beminger; Frank Richards - Sam Garsell; Owen McGiveney - Harry MacWade; Lou Lubin - Waiter; Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer - Bus Boy; Bill Self - Pat's Caddy; Gussie Moran - Herself; Babe Didrikson Zaharias - Herself; Don Budge - Himself; Alice Marble - Herself; Betty Hicks - Herself; Beverly Hanson - Herself; Helen Dettweiler - Sports Star; Joe Bernard - Gibby; Paul Brinegar; Charles Buchinsky - Hank Tasling; Mae Clarke - Woman Golfer; Fred Coby; Frankie Darro; Kay Deslys - Shooting Gallery Proprietor; Helen Eby-Rock - Woman Golfer; Pancho Gonzales; Cameron A. Grant - Reporter; Tom Harmon - Sportscaster; Sam Hearn - Lawyer; Crauford Kent - Tennis Umpire; Louis Mason - Railway Conductor; Bill McLean; Franklin Parker - Himself; Sam Pierce; John Close; Kay English; King Mojave - Linesman; Charlie Murray, Jr. - Line Judge; Bill Lewin; Jerry Schumacher; Hank Weaver - Commentator; Russ Clark - Trooper; Tom Gibson
Pat Pemberton (Hepburn) is a brilliant athlete, except when her domineering fiancé is around. The ladies golf championship is in her reach until she gets flustered by his presence at the final holes. He wants them to get married and forget the whole thing, but she cannot give up on herself that easily. She enlists the help of Mike Conovan (Tracy), a slightly shady sports promoter. Together they face mobsters, a jealous boxer (Aldo Ray), and a growing mutual attraction.
The score for the film was composed and conducted by David Raksin, with orchestrations by Robert Franklyn and Ruby Raksin.[1] Of his music, Raksin said "My music was sly and a mite jazzy, and despite the fact that everyone seemed to like it, so did I."[2]
The complete score was issued on cd in 2009, on Film Score Monthly records.
References
^Bettencourt, Scott (2009). Release notes for David Raksin at MGM (1950-1957) by David Raksin (CD online notes). Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.: Film Score Monthly (Vol. 12, No. 2).
^Bradford, Marilee (2009). Release notes for David Raksin at MGM (1950-1957) by David Raksin, 18 (CD liner notes). Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.: Film Score Monthly (Vol. 12, No. 2).
