The writing team of Betty Comden and Adolph Green had successive hits with "Bells Are Ringing." The first was on Broadway where the musical play ran for 924 performances from 1956-1959. The second was this 1960 film starring Judy Holliday and Dean Martin. Holliday and Jean Stapleton reprised their roles from the play as Ella Peterson and Sue, respectively. The Broadway romp won Holliday a Tony award as best actress in a musical, and co-star Sydney Chaplin the Tony as best actor in a musical. While the film just received one Oscar nomination – Andre Previn for musical composition, it was a box office hit. Musicals were supposed to have been passé by 1960, but this film showed there was still interest in the genre. Indeed, every decade since has had at least one smash hit musical, and some have had a few to several. The ingredients for success in that genre today are either a knockout plot or dynamite music. Some have had both. This film has a dilly of a plot with a very clever story idea. And, of its songs, three became popular tunes in their day – "Just in Time," "The Party's Over," and "Long Before I Knew You."For history buffs, "Bells Are Ringing" also has a bit of nostalgia, showing the days when businesses and people used telephone answering services. "Susanswerphone" is a clever name the writers gave to the business in this film. Another very clever, and funny aspect is the bookie betting system based on music. Racetracks were represented by names of classic composers. The parody of Handel's Hallelujah chorus is excellent, and I don't think irreverent. Otto Prantz (played superbly by Eddie Foy Jr.), "What is Handel?" Chorus, "Hialeah, Hialeah!" Prantz, "What is Handle?" Chorus, "Hialeah, Hialeah." Prantz, "Oh, what a system."Holliday, Martin and the entire cast are very good. One of the numbers toward the end of the film, "Drop That Name" has Ella singing with an ensemble of a cast of people at the party. It may hold the record for most name-dropping ever in a movie. Holliday especially shows her talent with some skits in which she plays a number of different characters with voice changes and mannerisms to suit. Here are a couple funny lines from the film. For more funny dialog snippets, see the Quotes section on this IMDb Web page of the film. Blake Barton (played by Frank Gorshin), "So I get this image see, of a ostrich – a ostrich trying to bury his head in a cement pavement." Two guys listening to him, "Cuckoo. Cuckoo."Jeffrey Moss, "You know, if I hadn't found you crawling around on my floor, I wouldn't be invited anyplace. I'd just be resting comfortably, face down, in the gutter."

Copyright 1960. A Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer picture. New York opening at the Radio City Music Hall: 23 June 1960 (ran 7 weeks). U.K. release: 9 October 1960. Australian release: 20 October 1960. 11,309 feet. 125 minutes.SYNOPSIS: The operator of a telephone answering service falls in love with one of her clients.NOTES: Judy Holliday's last film. She died 7 June 1965. Also Arthur Freed's last musical and his second last film (see "Light in the Piazza"). M-G-M production number: 1760. Shooting from 7 October 1959 through 24 December 1959. Negative cost: $2,203,123. Initial world- wide rentals gross: $3,985,950 (which means that after adding print, advertising and distribution expenses, the film did little more than break even). The Screen Writers Guild gave Comden and Green an award for the Best Written American Musical of 1960.COMMENT: A much under-rated movie. Admittedly, it was, according to all reports, difficult to make. Judy Holliday (repeating her stage success) was not in good health, but there is no sign of any strain or nervousness in her typically ebullient performance. Her timing is absolutely perfect and she realty enlivens every scene in which she appears. Dean Martin also shines. In fact, he often looks as delightfully bewildered as we are by the enjoyably screwy plot. As a musical, "Bells Are Ringing" is commendably innovative – an odd mixture of realism, fantasy and even surrealism. But alas, unlike me and other professional critics, neighborhood audiences were not entranced. Nevertheless, I feel sure that this is a movie that will always have a central core of fervent admirers – and you can count me as one of them. You'll notice than Comden and Green, who wrote the Broadway success, also penned the screen adaptation. That's why, for once, all the elements, including the songs, that thrilled Broadway audiences have not only been carried forward intact to the movie, but even enhanced!

I first saw this film when they made a new 35mm CinemaScope/Metrocolor print for the Joseph Papp theater back in the seventies. I thought it was mildly entertaining but very stagy and padded with too many unrelated subplots. At least the color and CinemaScope looked good although the production value made the movie seem as if it had been made a decade earlier. By 1960, many musicals, were being shot at least in part on location (i.e. "Oklahoma!", "South Pacific") rather than on artificial looking studio sets. In terms of the cast, Dean and Gorshon were amusing. Holiday is an acquired taste. I thought she was good in "Born Yesterday" but her dumb blond act seemed a bit stale ten years later and she was too old for this role. The musical numbers ranged from good ("Just in Time") to ridiculous (The betting song, "The Midas Touch"). I recently screened the picture again on TCM and I found it even more dated. It's worth seeing once but don't expect the quality level of the director's earlier pictures.

I was wondering why the end scene has Judy in a blue dress that is not at all a good shade for her. she should be in some color more her shade. the rest of her wardrobe is Hollywood style why not her last performance.