I was born too late to appreciate Bob Hope, since his talent showed mostly in presenting and stand-up. He has mostly left behind a less-than-stellar movie career, as evidenced by his highest rated movie (in IMDb) being The Muppet Movie, and even that's not nearly high enough to be in the Top 250. I enjoyed his Fancy Pants, but I have to say that was largely due to the presence of Lucille Ball.

I am, however, a mad fan of Katharine Hepburn and eagerly devour all of her movies. But great as she is, she still has some clunkers in her repertoire, and unfortunately this is one of them.

Egads, the Russian accent. I think that once she realized how bad it sounded (not for lack of trying), she just went all out to ham up the performance. There's chemistry between the two legends that are Hepburn and Hope, but the script lets them down, and the lines mostly fall flat. It doesn't even venture into camp, in which the movie's worth a watch just because you want to see Hepburn play Chinese (Dragon Seed) or a mountain girl (Spitfire). I would pretty much only recommend this for die-hard Hope or Hepburn enthusiasts (like me).

Not every movie needs to win awards, and not every movie needs to be a serious dramatic work of art; that's where 'The Iron Petticoat' comes in.

I wasn't alive when this movie came out, so I don't care if the original writer didn't like it, and I don't care if the actors didn't like each other or any other behind-the-scenes production problems; I just care about having something to laugh at.

When the philosophical differences between communism and capitalism can be made into jokes, it gives me plenty to laugh at especially the way Bob Hope delivers his lines in his classic style.

Thanks to TCM for airing movies like 'The Iron Petticoat' that may have outlived its time, but is still worth watching to appreciate a bygone era.