A sparkly Day blends in well with the slapstick and large comedic cast. The 110- minutes amounts to a hectic pace full of gags and skits. I liked the first part best where all the space-age gadgetry goes bonkers. I was thinking afterwards the movie should be called "Lift Off". The second part shifts toward a sketchy spy plot: at the same time, the screenplay suddenly can't seem to decide who's who. Spy stories were popular at the time, probably from the movies' James Bond and TV's Get Smart. Here it's mainly a rack to hang the parade of comedy bits on.From McGiver to Godfrey to Lynde to the others, all get comedy time under the kinetic hand of director Tashlin, known for his cartoonish style. At the same time, the cameos do a lot to extend movie runtime. Taylor and Day blend well as a couple, while the husky actor manages his tongue-in-cheek role surprisingly well for a serious actor. And what about that floor-cleaning robot. Who could have guessed it would be the stuff of silly nightmares. Note too the abundant innuendo, especially the gay aspects, as Hollywood's 30-year Production Code is increasingly ignored. If the film has a down side, it's probably the relentless flow of comedic bits-- no extended conversations here. Of course, some skits do better than others; still, there's not much chance to savor the better ones before they're replaced by a new bit. Nonetheless, it's a bouncy slice of entertainment and further tribute to Day's sunny uplift even on cloudy nights like mine. Now if I can just get lucky my next fishing trip, maybe I too can hook a gorgeous mermaid.

"The Glass Bottom Boat" offers what, in the mid-1960s, was a powerhouse cast. Some of the stars are still remembered today. Dick Martin and Dom DeLuise, for instance; and Paul Lynde, whose presence was guaranteed to brighten up any dull movie.Some stars have, over the years, lost their lustre. Arthur Godfrey's, for instance. The comedy team Bob & Ray once poked fun at Arthur Godfrey by saying he seemed to be on every station all day long. Godfrey was an early form of Dick Clark. A television pioneer, he was probably most famous during his day for "Talent Scouts," though his credits at the time were numerous.Eric Fleming also has flowed through the fingers like the sands of time. It was Fleming and not Clint Eastwood who was the top-billed star of the then-popular show "Rawhide." Whether Fleming would have gone on to any sort of movie career is unknown since he drowned the same year "Glass Bottom Boat" was released.John McGiver and Edward Andrews are also welcome faces to movie buffs. Though probably most famous for appearances in "Sixteen Candles" and "Gremlins" Andrews had a long and industrious career as a supporting actor.What of the real stars, who are meant to carry the movie? Doris Day is Doris Day. Her acting range was minimal but she was all right if you liked that sort of thing. Her biggest selling point was her singing but, apart from the title song, she has little opportunity to exert her lungs. Though the DVD shows her in some sort of exotic dancing outfit, she's only in it for a few seconds of screen time.As for Rod Taylor, despite anchoring several well-known features (including "Separate Tables" and George Pal's "The Time Machine"), I've always found him an actor lacking in charisma. Early on in "GBB" he has his shirt off. I suppose beef-cake is his biggest selling point. To me, his best acting job was the voice work he did in Disney's animated "101 Dalmations." The Glass Bottom Boat itself has little screen time. This is not a movie about oceanography, though that might have made it interesting. It's a movie about space. In the 1960s, space was the big thing, and everyone from Gregory Peck ("Marooned") to Don Knotts ("the Reluctant Astronaut") were making pictures about astronauts.The movie seems to be about some aspect of the space program, with spies trying to get their hands on some gismo or the other. The actual plot hardly matters. It's just an excuse to let grown people run around like children. And not-too-bright children, at that. I had just turned five when this movie came out, and I didn't want to see it. My parents and brother went, but I protested and spend a lovely evening with my grandmother instead. Viewing it at last as an adult, I believe I made the right decision.The best thing that can be said about "The Glass Bottom Boat" is that it is innocuous, with some very funny stuff interspersed in all the other goings-on.

Frank Tashlin, a former cartoonist and animator, made a couple of hilarious comedies in the 50s -- "Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?" and "The Girl Can't Help It." The material was good to begin with but Tashlin buffed it up to a high gloss.The same can't be said for "The Glass Bottom" boat, a story which is unfocused and a little slapdash. The wit is almost entirely slapstick or absurd in a curiously shivery way. You want something from the early 60s? You'll find it in here somewhere. There's Rod Taylor as the head of some super-duper space project involving the CIA, Russian spies trying to steal the secret formula, and security agencies trying to prevent it.There's Doris Day as the cute, very sun-tanned, and infinitely desirable woman he hires to help him write his autobiography but is really there just to be around him. She's mistaken for a Soviet spy because her dog is named Vladimir. There are Dom DeLuise and Paul Lynde at odds with each other. DeLuise gets his foot stuck in a trash can filled with banana cream cake. Day, trying to help him, gets her foot stuck too. This is known as a funny scene. Paul Lynde dresses in various disguises and tries to fool Day into revealing her true identity. This is also funny.Well, as they say, if you don't have eggs you can't make an omelet. No, wait. That's not what they say. They say -- wait a minute -- yes, they say you can't make an omelet without breaking eggs, and the problem here is that the eggs are kind of soft boiled. The gags just aren't very funny.I'll give you an example. Doris visit Rod's house in order to bake him a cake. First, he has to show her around his ultra-modern kitchen. It's full of robotic gadgets of various kinds, each accompanied by its own boop-boop-de-doop electronic sounds as it does its business. Let's see. There's the automatic incinerator, run by "a photoelectric cell." Then there's the robot egg beater. Then there's the sentient vacuum cleaner that zips out of a panel in the wall and sucks up whatever happens to be dropped on the floor. (I could use one of them.) A full FIVE MINUTES is spent on demonstrating these modern labor-saving devices. And the last one -- when the vacuum cleaner comes out and begins sucking on Day's big toe, which is not a bad idea in and of itself, and after a tug of war finally makes off with her flip-flop and dashes back into the wall with it -- why, that's a real knee slapper.Rod Taylor is really quite good, confident in his Aussie masculinity. But Day, over 40, looks great. Everything about her body and face is chipper and tan, and wardrobe has given her a lot of white garments, including an infinitely inviting pleated white skirt, that sets off her tawny legs in an almost salacious fashion.It's clumsily done and crude. The kids will get every gag in it. But if you're desperate for diversion, this may do the job. You get to hear Doris Day sing a song that sounds like "Hush, Little Baby, Don't You Cry," but the subject of which is sea food.

We visited Catalina 2 weeks ago. (Oct. 2006) The current Glass Bottom Boat operation claims that the actual glass bottom boat used in the movie is float in the harbor. In fact, they report to use the old boat in peak season.This is contrary to the statement on the IMDb website which reports "Trivia" that the boat sank earlier in 2006 off the coast of LA. The IMDb story reports that the vessel was en-route to San Francisco to become a restaurant. The glass bottom boats are hardly big enough to be a restaurant. I suspect that someone confused the ferry boat or some other vessel with the actual Glass Bottom Boat.