Reception
Upon the film's release it received mostly positive reviews. The New York Times considered the film "immensely funny", but criticized its musical numbers and length. The Motion Picture Herald gave the film a very favorable review. Motion Picture Daily felt that it was Abbott and Costello's "corniest" and "best" comedy yet. The use of slapstick was praised by the New York Morning Telegraph, yet the publication thought "it should have been better Abbott and Costello."
The film still receives mainy favorable reviews. Ted Okuda called the film "one of the team's best." Jim Mulholland has described it as the "team's best film next to Buck Privates" In addition, Rotten Tomatoes reported that 100% of critics gave the film positive write-ups based on five reviews. Allmovie contributor, Hal Erickson, gave the film three out of a possible five stars and stated that the "moving candle" scene might be "Costello's funniest-ever screen scene." Film critic, Leonard Maltin, gave the film three out of four stars and noted it as "Prime A&C."
Read more about this topic: Hold That Ghost
Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“To aim to convert a man by miracles is a profanation of the soul. A true conversion, a true Christ, is now, as always, to be made by the reception of beautiful sentiments.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)
“He’s leaving Germany by special request of the Nazi government. First he sends a dispatch about Danzig and how 10,000 German tourists are pouring into the city every day with butterfly nets in their hands and submachine guns in their knapsacks. They warn him right then. What does he do next? Goes to a reception at von Ribbentropf’s and keeps yelling for gefilte fish!”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)