Monkey Business

"It's some fun!"

1952 1h 37m EN

👍

6.7

SOLID

★6.7TMDB · 308

ComedyScience Fiction

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

Research chemist Barnaby Fulton works on a fountain of youth pill for a chemical company. One of the labs chimps gets loose in the laboratory and mixes chemicals, but then pours the mix into the water cooler. When trying one of his own samples, washed down with water from the cooler, Fulton begins to act just like a twenty-year-old and believes his potion is working. Soon his wife and boss are also behaving like children.

“It's some fun!”

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Cast

Cary Grant
Barnaby Fulton
Ginger Rogers
Edwina Fulton
Charles Coburn
Oliver Oxley
Marilyn Monroe
Lois Laurel
Hugh Marlowe
Hank Entwhistle
Henri Letondal
Jerome Kitzel
Robert Cornthwaite
Dr. Zoldeck
Larry Keating
GJ Culverly

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Howard Hawks
Writers: Ben Hecht, Charles Lederer, I. A. L. Diamond
Languages: English
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 7

ERA

Did you know

74 years old — a genuine piece of film history.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Howard Hawks, shot by Milton Krasner. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Leigh Harline. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor William B. Murphy shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 7

CAST

Did you know

Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers and Charles Coburn carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 7

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "It's some fun!".

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 7

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0044916 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Howard Hawks directs. Milton Krasner behind the camera. Leigh Harline scores. William B. Murphy cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

174 years old — a genuine piece of film history.
2Directed by Howard Hawks, shot by Milton Krasner. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
3Original score by Leigh Harline. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
4Editor William B. Murphy shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
5Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers and Charles Coburn carry the top of the cast.
6Marketing tagline: "It's some fun!".
7IMDB entry: tt0044916 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
8Released under 11 different titles around the world.

The technical file

Cinematography: Milton Krasner
Original score: Leigh Harline
Editing: William B. Murphy
Makeup / hair: Ben Nye
Runtime: 97 min · 1h 37m
Status: Released
Box office: $2,000,000
Original language: EN
IMDB: Monkey Business (1952)

Also by

Howard Hawks

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Community reviews

What people are saying

CinemaSerf2024-07-14
★ 7/10
Cary Grant is the professor "Fulton" working for "Oxley" (Charles Coburn) on a project to find some way of turning back time and reversing the ageing process. They are experimenting with various formulae on a selection of rather agile chimps, and it's actually one of them who manages to co come up with a solution that when, inadvertently, added to the water in the cooler manages to turn the academic into a small child. He also feels a bit like a new man, too! This wears off after a short while, so he gets his wife "Edwina" (Ginger Rogers) to sit in on his next experiment - only this time he takes an even stronger dose. Except, he thinks it's his prescribed doses that are causing his youthfulness, whereas we know it's the water in the communal bottle - and that isn't anywhere near as restricted as his medication. Add to the mix, an on-form Marilyn Monroe and loads of daft baby talk and we are left with an enjoyable, if maybe just a little too repetitive, look at the child in all of us. There's a paint fight, some rubber band pranking and maybe neither Grant nor Monroe should ever have got into the car mid-way through. Coburn was always a master at the understated contribution, and here he is a perfect foil for the silliness of the plot as the story gathers pace and heads into the realms of plain screwball. Grant had comedy timing in spades, and with Rogers and Monroe showing they, too, were never far off the pace this is good fun to watch.

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