It’s always a pleasure to watch a snob get their comeuppance for being obnoxious and off-putting. This is especially true of those aggravating types who always claim to have the inside track “on what people are really like” behind closed doors, particularly in European countries which are touted for their so-called sexual maturity and cultural superiority compared to that of the United States. Such is the case with Bob Hope from Bachelor In Paradise who portrays one of those in-the-know, best-selling “Masters Of Sex” type authors ✍️ whose laughable central conceit is believing that he is god’s gift to all women.
Hope’s character (A.J. Niles) is forced out of his snooty, French Riviera ivory “research” tower after an unscrupulous business manager takes off with all of the money he has made from the series of sexy, tell-all best-sellers which had made him rich. Sad to say, this unsavory state of affairs forces Niles into bankruptcy and also results in huge income tax problems. So, his publisher suggests that Niles should return to America and write about sex lives in suburbia, pay off his tax debts, and then keep the parade of paperback bestsellers flowing along.
Niles manages to overcome his misgivings about all this and goes incognito, engaging in “research”for his new book – which mainly consists of cavorting with the housewives who live in the new San Fernando Valley (L.A.) subdivision called Paradise Village while their husbands are at work. Of course, Niles would be unlikely to get away with this assumed identity in the age of Google, but in the mid-20th century era he easily slipped into the role of the happiest (and only bachelor) in the village.
Things really get interesting when he rents a home in the village from Rosemary Howard, played by the wonderfully glamorous Lana Turner. She may have the best couture wardrobe of any actress who had ever portrayed a real estate agent in Hollywood history! In fact, Bachelor In Paradise is ideal viewing for anyone who loves mid-century home architecture, home decor, clothing styles and automobiles.
Much of the film was made on location in in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles giving considerable insight into what the area actually looked like half a century ago. Although Bachelor In Paradise works delightfully well as a romantic comedy with plenty of quips to move it along, what might be most telling about this film is the bothersome, critical attitude that Niles has about his new living situation.
In the Bachelor story the suburban lifestyle of Paradise Village is much maligned by Niles for its supposed lack of culture and sophistication – not to mention the local architecture, the freeways, the radio stations and anything else to complain about. So, it’s pleasing to see Rosemary take him down a peg or two for making fun of her community and her house without good reason, even though he had agreed to rent it.
It would be an understatement to say that during the 1950s and 1960s that affordable, suburban ranch-style development homes were quite in demand by many Americans who had worked hard in defense industries and other related activities during the Second World War. They were eager to leave overcrowded and decaying inner-cities for newer homes with modern conveniences. Naturally, they were also quite desirable to World War Two veterans who had survived the horrors and rigors of warfare and were eager to start families. Homes of the type featured in the film were a dream come true for many Americans and central to the Bachelor In Paradise story.
In real life social commentators of the mid-century era – of which Bachelor In Paradise is a firm representation, were critical about what a cultural and aesthetic wasteland American suburbia had apparently become. These self-appointed critics and guardians of lifestyle still prattle on about these issues now! In any case, the complaints and objections Niles expresses about Paradise Village are not just about him being effete or expressing class superiority, but seem designed to create for Rosemary a sense of dissatisfaction and inferiority in her lifestyle where it does not necessarily need to exist. This is still disturbingly true in our lives today where advertisers and what we now call “influencers” always want us to consume more and more – never being content with what we already have.
It is pleasing to see that Rosemary refuses to buy into any of this, content and self-assured enough to flatly rejects his advances (at least initially). This is the second conceit of Bachelor In Paradise – with Niles assuming that since they are both single and he being such a man-of-the-world that she should automatically want to go on dates with him to be regaled by tales of his worldliness. While the other women in the community fall for Niles’s shtick, Rosemary sees through his caddishness and pretentious manner, making sure he learns a few lessons in humility and maturity along the way!
Overall, Bachelor In Paradise is an enjoyable viewing, especially for aficionados of mid-century lifestyles and romantic comedies although the ending came as something of a disappointment to this writer. However, I thought the best takeaway from the narrative is the importance of sticking up for yourself when others try to tear you down and make you feel inferior. That message is strong and clear in any era.
