I love this movie so much

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Just watched this again in order to get in the spirit of Christmas. It's another Bob Hope vehicle in which he tries to get out of jams he himself caused. He's a con man trying to raise more than a thousand dollars in order to avoid getting killed! It all takes place during the holidays. In fact, this is the movie that introduced the song "Silver Bells" in which Hope shares a duet with his leading lady, Marilyn Maxwell, here. There's also William Frawley-later Fred Mertz on "I Love Lucy"-and Lloyd Nolan and Fred Clark to add in the fun. Oh, and one of the writers is Frank Tashlin who was previously a director of Warner Bros. cartoons. He supposedly directed some of the more cartoonish sequences like that of the hilarious one involving a female mannequin who is allowed to appear nude in a movie made during the Code era! Okay, so on that note, I highly recommend The Lemon Drop Kid.

Very funny 1951 Bob Hope film where he plays a small-time gangster who has accidentally dropped money of a bigger mob person at the track and then finds an ingenious way to get the money back.The gags are great with Marilyn Maxwell as Hope's girlfriend and eventual partner in the scheme.Jane Darwell showed a gift of comedy in this hilarious film. As one of the old dolls, she brings plenty of humor as the wife of a convicted safe-cracker about to be released at holiday time.Hope's great idea of setting up a licensed home for old dolls is very humorous. How will he pay for the home in a gambling home? He sends his band of crooks out playing Santa Claus and soliciting money.All goes well until Lloyd Nolan, a real big-time gangster, gets wind of the scheme and steals the money from Hope. Bob has to retrieve the money and free the dolls who have been taken hostage by a ruthless Nolan.Funny and yet very poignant with the holiday-spirit like ending.

The silver bells are clinking down on Fifth Avenue here in New York City as I write this review, and what movie is more appropriate to write about than the one that famous Christmas song came from? I find this to be Bob Hope's best non-Road movie; funny, touching, and filled with the joy of the season. This is not a remake of the 1934 Lee Tracy movie, although it does surround a character addicted to lemon drops who happens to hang out at a race track. That was a sentimental tale about a ne'er-do-well father who does all he can to get his kid back. This movie is a lot lighter and instead of a father missing his child, it is about a con man who learns something about giving when he decides to help out a group of old ladies. Of course, he has his own selfish motives, but when gangsters threaten to take over what he has come to see as the right thing to do, Hope takes action and reforms himself, winning the heroine (the lovely Marilyn Maxwell) in the process.The leading old lady is a street newspaper seller played by the Academy Award Winning Jane Darwell who is absolutely lovely here and will steal your heart, much like she did as the birdseed seller in London years later in "Mary Poppins". William Frawley is Hope's crusty sidekick, whose gravely voiced singing introduces a more cynical "Silver Bells" ("Chunk it in, Chunk it in, or Santy will give you a mickey"). Fifth Avenue and the surrounding snowy streets become a Christmas wonderland, a vision that has made New York one of the most romantic Christmas getaways for years. Maxwell and Hope also sing the delightful "It Only Costs a Dime to Dream" to the old ladies in the redecorated gambling home (where the ladies sleep on moving crap tables). Hope even ends up in drag, looking like Ray Bolger in "Where's Charley?", and has a delightful exchange with another old lady (the wonderful Ida Moore) about his hour glass figure. Fred Clark, that delightful sourpuss, is great as the gangster and Lloyd Nolan is also amusing as another racketeer who tries to get his hands on all the old dolls so he can take over Hope's racket.Future "Ed Wood" veteran Tor Johnson ("Night of the Ghouls", "Plan Nine From Outer Space") is instantly recognizable as the Swedish wrestler whom Hope involves in his scheme while other typical Damon Runyeon style characters are played by such familiar faces as Harry Bellaver and Jay C. Flippen. The lovely Andrea King is all Southern charm as Clark's mistress whom Hope mistakenly passes on a fake tip to at the race track to his imminent regret. Veteran diminutive character actor Francis Pierlot has an amusing cameo as Darwell's recently prison released husband who has an act for cracking safes. This is a must for the holiday season that will charm everybody and make you feel good about the true spirit of the holidays.

Our entire family from great grandmother on down to the great grandchildren love this movie. It will never be outdated. It is funny, decent and there is never a dull moment. This movie is truly a classic and such a refreshing change from the liberal nonsense that the industry is spewing out today.