Star Spangled Girl

Neil Simon's Broadway dud, which featured Connie Stevens, Anthony Perkins and Richard Benjamin, has been recast but not rethought for this unbearable screen-translation. The grating text has been preserved as if each verbal volley was actually worth keeping. If this picture were to succeed at all, screenwriters Arnold Margolin and Jim Parker should have thrown out most of the source material and started from scratch. Twangy-voiced swimmer Sandy Duncan, an Olympic hopeful arriving in Los Angeles to teach and to train, gets mixed up with her nutty bungalow neighbors, a writer and an editor for a protest newspaper (the Nitty Gritty...its motto is "A Remedy for a Sick Society"). Duncan ends up working for the fellas, but she can't cook, can't type, and can't take shorthand. She pretends not to know how to dust. The guys (Tony Roberts and manic Todd Susman) pretend to find her adorable. Actually, Duncan has an appealing personality, but the silly voice she uses here (coupled with the dim lines) just about ruins her chances of charming the audience. The picture is over-lit, over-directed, over-acted, and completely underwhelming. * from ****