Laurence Tuccori Comedian Jack Benny spent the second half of his long career poking fun at this film, disparaging it at every opportunity and mocking his performance in it. For the longest time I believed this was just a joke and that the film wasn't nearly as bad as Jack made it out to be. Oh boy, was I wrong. THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT is possibly the most ill-advised project Benny ever signed up for, and I say that as a die-hard Benny fan and proud owner of every episode of his radio show.He plays Athaneal, third trumpet player in a radio orchestra, who falls asleep during a broadcast and dreams that he's an angel sent to Earth to blow the last trumpet, signaling the end of the world, at exactly midnight. But a couple of fallen angels, who'd previously failed to do the job, are determined to stop him. Confusion ensues as the inept Athaneal attempts to complete his mission, oblivious to the deceitful wiles of his opponents. Given the premise, the fine supporting cast (Reginald Gardner, Franklin Pangborn, Alexis Smith, Margaret Dumont,Guy Kibbee, Mike Mazurki) and veteran director Raoul Walsh at the helm, this should have been a surefire hit. So why does the entire project fall flat on its face? There's several reasons. The script is terrible,the supporting cast is wasted and the comedy is lame in the extreme. Neither of the credited screenplay writers demonstrate the slightest talent for writing comedy above a fifth grade level, and it's directed with a complete absence of style. An overwhelming sense of desperation pervades every scene involving bits of business that might very - very - loosely be termed comedy, and the story's climax is so crudely constructed as to be downright embarrassing. On their own these failings cripple the film, but what really sabotages any chance of success for THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT is the casting or - more accurately - the miscasting of Jack Benny. By 1945 Benny's character was firmly established in the American psyche thanks to his long running and immensely popular radio show. As far as the public was concerned Benny was vain, penny pinching, petty, frequently exasperated and eternally 39 years old. He was a consummate comedian who didn't tell jokes but allowed himself more often than not to be the butt of jokes set up by the talented cast of characters he surrounded himself with on his weekly show. He could get a bigger laugh out of his patented pause than any punchline, and he was - despite his many apparent character flaws - universally loved by radio audiences.THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT takes advantage of exactly none of these traits, choosing instead to have Benny play a thinly sketched character who looks like Jack Benny but doesn't resemble him at all. There's nothing in the part of Athaneal that contemporary audiences could identify with, and nothing in this new Benny character that's funny enough to elicit a laugh either. Why have him be a trumpeter when he was universally known as a (very bad) violin player is a mystery. The sum total of these misjudgments is a film that's a major disappointment.I'm not surprised that Benny mocked it for the rest of his days. What else could he do? He had to have recognised it was an incredible career misstep and one which he was lucky to recover from because he didn't depend on films to sustain his popularity. Had his radio show writers been similarly dumb enough to tamper with a winning formula we probably wouldn't remember him today as one of the greats of American comedy.Check out more of my reviews at http://thefilmivejustseen.blogspot.com/

blanche-2 Jack Benny was a fabulous comedian who was very successful in radio and television, and made a few films. This one, "The Horn Blows at Midnight," was one that apparently wasn't a big hit - one hears everything from it bombed to did okay but no smash. Benny, however, made a lot of jokes about how it died at the box office.Maybe the film works better today than it did toward the end of World War II, but it's fun to watch. Benny plays a trumpet player stuck on a harpist (Alexis Smith). She helps him get a radio job playing during the "Paradise Coffee Program." The coffee, instead of keeping you awake, however, advertises that it helps one sleep and have pleasant dreams. During a broadcast, Benny falls asleep and dreams he's an angel dispatched to earth to blow a trumpet and start the world's end. Being Jack Benny, he has a few problems.The film has some very funny sections, including Ethanael (Benny) in a huge cup of coffee, nearly drowning. Elevators are used to transport the angels (and there's a shortage of them in heaven, by the way), and when the angels land on earth, they're in the lobby of a New York hotel. Benny and Smith costar with Franklin Pangborn, Margaret Dumont and Guy Kibbee, all extremely talented at comedy. The script, unfortunately, doesn't support them as much as it should, so the overall effect is spotty.Nevertheless, this is a very entertaining movie for the most part with some good ideas and good direction. If only the script had been a little stronger - it would have been a classic.

bernie-50 In a dream Nathaniel (Jack Benny) an angle (just one of the masses of angles in a seemingly endless angelic orchestra) is honored by The Chef (Monte Blue) with a unique job of removing a planet (Earth) that destruction is the only redemption. This task requires the horn of Gabriel to be blown at midnight to Harold the destruction. Naturally two fallen angels recognizing the inevitable try to distract Nathaniel. Will he succeed or become a fallen angel himself? Will the angel Elizabeth (Alexis Smith) that got him his chance have to save him?This is the movie that I think off when some one mentions Jack Benny. I especially liked the eating scene. You can see it again in some of the inexpensive pizza chains. However the whole movie was well done. Watch poor detective, Franklin Pangborn who asks if the elevator goes up forever and gets is answer. Just watching the trumpet traveling around make you want to jump in the movie and grab it. Other scenes make you want to put on your water wings.Watching this is enough to give you the twinges.

Fred I saw this one New Year's night on TV when I was about eleven. The second time I saw it was last night when it was on cable. It was true to my memory. Jack Benny WAS stuck in a giant coffee cup and it WAS an extremely funny movie. The coffee cup gag is one of the most surreal things I've ever seen in a movie from Hollywood's golden age. Imagine a Tex Avery cartoon done in live action and you'll get an idea of the visual. Jack Benny really does look as if he's being filmed in a mechanized coffee cup/coffee pot/coffee spoon structure. It's incredible. Harold Lloyd would have been hard-pressed to match this scene. This scene itself makes this movie well worth watching. The mood of the movie is happy and bouncy as only movies made between 1945 and 1949 are. There must have been some optimism informing Hollywood's imagination as the Second World War wound down. Movies between then and the beginning of the Korean War practically burst with a sense of victory. THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT works as a testimony to a time when America felt itself riding on top of the world. There are other sight gags taking advantage of vertiginous views. People dangle from the ledge of buildings throughout. This is directed by the man who directed HIGH SIERRA, THE ROARING TWENTIES and a few other classics. The dialogue is very much like radio comedy. Jack Benny was, of course, a radio comic. The scene in the diner would have played quite well, if not even a bit better, on radio. I find it significant that a few years after this movie came out, Benny performed in a radio version of it. Others have commented on the fact that he turned this movie's relative box-office failure into a running joke which lasted the rest of his career. Benny's shtick demanded that he exaggerate negative qualities: He deliberately played violin off-key to highlight his radio persona's vanity; He pretended to feud with Fred Allen, when in reality there was no hostility between them. Both comedians boosted their ratings with their supposed feud. He was only playing his part by making people think THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT was the cinematic equivalent of his violin-playing. Not only was it up to Hollywood's standard comedic levels of that time, it surpassed them. Perhaps my familiarity with old-time radio makes me more partial to this movie than the average viewer. I am surprised, nevertheless, that many people find THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT a little pointless. The visuals are amazing, the dialogue is snappy and the music is great. You'll hear a tune which sounds a bit like the Looney Tunes theme. There's a reason for this. Carl Stalling was one of the people who worked on the music, and he worked on many Warner Brothers cartoons. If you like comedy you'll enjoy this movie.