Review of Love in High Gear

The dumb dredges of society and an even dumber detective descend upon a hotel run by hicks for all sorts of slamming doors, men hiding in closets, meddling relatives and everybody basically getting banged up in the type of farce that trekked around hayseed community theaters up to the end of the days of summerstock and influenced the hit Broadway comedy "Noises Off!". A silent movie actor by the name of Harrison Ford plays a jewel thief who steals a pearl necklace at a society wedding, hides it in the suitcase of an innocent maiden reluctantly engaged to an effeminate member of the elite set and follows her to the country hotel run by someone straight out of "Li'l Abner", who along with a totally deaf maid, is bemused by the actions of these city slickers who may have a lot in the way of money in the bank but not much in the way of brain cells. The deaf maid's misunderstandings are funny for a while but after a while (way before the film's hour long running time is over) it gets a bit too much. Still, it's hysterically funny to see buffoon detective Fred Kelsey keep getting into all sorts of scrapes as he attempts without success to capture the man he believes to be the jewel thief. This is probably Kelsey's biggest part-he had tons of walk-ons as imperious hotel detectives and dumb cops, probably most remembered from "Honeymoon Hotel" in the Busby Berkley musical "Dames". This entry in low-budget cinema certainly doesn't outwear its welcome, although at times, the comedy is a bit forced and over the top.