I’ll Take Sweden

I’ll Take Sweden (1965), starring Bob Hope, Tuesday Weld,  Frankie Avalon,  Dina Merrill

In I’ll Take Sweden, Bob Hope will do almost anything to keep his impressionable teenage daughter (Tuesday Weld) from marrying her lazy boyfriend (Frankie Avalon), even if it means moving to Sweden.  But then he has to worry about a handsome Swede …

Review of I’ll Take Sweden

In short, I’ll Take Sweden is an enjoyable Bob Hope comedy.  It’s not great, but enjoyable.  It was Hope’s final starring role in a motion picture.  At 62 years old, he’s simply gotten too old to play the romantic lead.

There’s a lot of the expected Bob Hope verbal comedy, as well as some slapstick.  Especially towards the end when Hope is trying to rescue his daughter from the no-good Swedish playboy.  I’ll Take Sweden also attempts to be more “modern” by talking about how sex before marriage isn’t taboo in Sweden.  But as Hope points out, their marriage rate is abysmal.  As is America’s divorce rate at the time.

Cast of characters in I’ll Take Sweden

• Bob Holcomb (Bob Hope, My Favorite Brunette). An executive for an oil company, who takes his only daughter to Sweden to “protect” her from her beach bum fiancee.  But once there, he begins falling in love with a lovely fashion designer.  And his daughter starts falling for a handsome Swede, whose intentions are not honorable.
• JoJo Holcomb (Tuesday Weld, Soldier in the Rain).  Bob’s daughter, who stops speaking to him once she realizes how he’s tricked her boyfriend and herself.  Until she meets the handsome young Swede.  And she has to decide how “adult” she really is.
• Kenny Klinger (Frankie Avalon, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea).  Jojo’s beach bum fiancee, who’s inherited a small trailer and $1,200 from his grandmother.  And he plans to support Jojo on that.  Which is what turns Bob against him.  Later, Bob flies him to Sweden to rescue Jojo, but his feelings are hurt from how Jojo treated him.  But toward the end of the film, he shows his true colors …
• Karin Granstedt (Dina Merrill, Desk Set).  The lovely interior decorator that widower Bob falls in love with.  But she shares her country’s sexual morality values.  Which Bob doesn’t, and definitely doesn’t want his daughter to!
• Erik Carlson (Jeremy Slate, True Grit (1969).  Bob’s underling at the Sweden branch of the oil company.  A handsome young man, who wants to bed every pretty foreigner possible.  Including JoJo.  He tries at first to persuade her that Sweden has a “mature” attitude to pre-marital sex.  And invites her to a two-week “trial marriage” during his vacation.  But when she changes her mind at the last moment, he’s not above force.  A dislikable individual.

Editorial review of  I’ll Take Sweden courtesy of Amazon.com

Widower and single dad, oil company executive Bob Holcomb (Bob Hope, The  Road to Hong Kong) accepts a transfer to Sweden in hopes of keeping his daughter JoJo (Tuesday Weld, Pretty Poison) far away from her carefree, guitar-playing, marriage-minded boyfriend Kenny (Frankie Avalon, Beach Blanket Bingo). Little does Bob know that Sweden provides a more liberal view of all things romantic. So, its out of the frying pan and into the fire. But JoJo isn’t the only one with romance on her mind when Bob meets attractive interior designer Karin (Dina Merrill, Operation Petticoat). Plans for a romantic mountain resort weekend will turn into a slapstick roundelay when Kenny turns up with former girlfriend Marti (Rosemarie Frankland, A Hard Day s Night) and Bob’s assistant Erik (Jeremy Slate, Girls! Girls! Girls!), a wolf in sheep s clothing, sets his sights on JoJo. The Land of the Midnight Sun will never be the same when Bob Hope and crew land on her shores in the romantic comedy  I’ll Take Sweden.

Directed by Frederick De Cordova (Bedtime for Bonzo) from a screenplay by Nat Perrin (based on a story by Perrin, Bob Fisher and Arthur Marx),  I’ll Take Sweden co-stars Fay DeWitt (The Shakiest Gun in the West), Walter Sande (To Have and Have Not) and John Qualen (Casablanca).