Brewster's Millions (1945)

Written by CinemaSerf on July 1, 2022

"Monty Brewster" (Dennis O'Keefe) comes back from the war ready to settle down and marry his sweetheart "Peggy" (Helen Walker). Suddenly, though, he is contacted by a firm of lawyers who tell him that his estranged uncle made a mint in Bolivian tin and has left him $7m, on the condition that he spends $1m before his 30th birthday (approximately 2 months from now!) and that he cannot tell anyone what he is doing. Whatever he does; however generous he is; he simply seems to have a golden touch and having initially thought it'd be a synch to squander the money, he actually ends up in surplus at some stage and so the challenge is really on! The writing is superbly paced, loads of witty single-take scenes that, by half way, make you want to have someone ring a bell and offer you a towel. Rochester Anderson ("Jackson") steals most of his scenes as the butler-cum-voice of sanity throughout much of this comedy romp as his friends really do wonder what the hell he is doing! It's only 80 minutes, but it's full of character and charm.