Young Man's Fancy

Here's an industrial film touting the benefits of an all-electric house: kitchen, laundry room, the entire panoply of modern home conveniences is pressed into service to allow a young woman to entice the handsome -- if rather serious-minded -- young man her brother has brought home from college.

It's produced by the Edison Electric Institute, which is the trade group for publicly owned electricity producers.

It's a rather message-driven show, which uses the attempts of Bonnie Baken to interest Robert Casey. The setting has her starting out as a sloppy young girl, but as the movie progresses, she cleans up, dresses up, and cooks a ham steak for her family, all thanks to the all-electric, all-American kitchen.

This short is about a guy returning home and bringing a friend to stay over. A friend who is also a guy and sends the sister into a frenzy. Apparently there were incredibly desperate girls back in the day ready to throw themselves at the first guy new in town. Well he does not quite take to her at first as he is more interest in devices and an upcoming lecture about fungus. So there is the problem, what is this short trying to accomplish? Hm, there are several mentions of electricity within this short, but there is also several mentions of the fungus lecture. One can also not rule out that this is some workshop meant to help young girls lure men into marriage by pretending to be interested in the same things. I am going to have to go with the electricity as there seems no need to mention how everything, including the water heater, is electric and how great all the electric stuff in the house is if it was not some vague short put out by the electric company about how wonderful electricity is. Still, they could be a bit more direct as there are some that are going to focus in on that fungus lecture and wonder if they too could grow and raise fungus in the basement. The acting is over the top, the sister comes across as very immature someone who should not be helped in her quest to find a boyfriend, and the parents wooden. Still, it was more entertaining than other shorts I have seen from this era.

I'm not sure who this was shown to in the 1950's. I can't imagine this was shown in theaters. Maybe it was a classroom film to get the kids "hooked on electricity." And the amount of 1952 slang employed leads me to believe this one was intended for the kids. I was a tad confused as to why a healthy young man would pass up a swim with a pretty young woman for a lecture on fungus, then I realized, maybe he's just gay. Or, perhaps "horny" hadn't been invented yet. But, eventually, he falls for her and takes her to a dance, once she seduces him by using enough electricity.

Incredibly hammy acting was combined with having as many electrical appliances crammed in as possible. I counted 12 either mentioned or used. What, no electric hats or forks?

Maximum useless viewing. You'll learn nothing but what over-acting means.

A Young Man's Fancy is a short to be missed. The whole thing is incredibly dumb and suffers from a severe lack of reality. Basically a young woman has the hots for a guy in her class. When her brother brings this guy to their place for a dinner, this "heart throb" is more interested in the gadgets in the kitchen than her. Plenty of bad acting here as well. Rightfully skewered on Mystery Science Theater 3000 for its preposterous plotline and bad acting.

Am I really the first to comment on this one? Wow! A #1!

Wow, what an expose of the suburbs this is. Mother (apparently blind) sings the praises of electrical appliances while daughter Judy eats bacon like it's going to get up and leave. Then the real drama begins. Brother brings home college buddy Alexander Phipps ("sounds revolting," exclaims sis), and the two of them head upstairs to take a shower. After that homoerotic tableau, Alex spends much of the rest of the film becoming closer to Judy's mother, with whom he shares a deep affection for all things electrical, while Judy throws out her back trying to impress Alex, who she ultimately found dreamy. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll wonder how this one got past the censors. Dog bless the Satellite of Love.