GrimPrecise I'll tell you why so serious

Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

Kaydan Christian A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

binapiraeus An eccentric, out-of-this-world group of scientists have been working for nine years now on a huge encyclopedia which is supposed to be complete and entirely up-to-date; until the youngest of them, Professor Potts, the philologist, after a short talk with the garbage man finds out that his article about slang is COMPLETELY outdated - because he used old books about the slang words of the last generations instead of listening to today's real-life people... And that's exactly what he decides to do: to leave their secluded study for once, to go out and gather new slang words and people who are liable to know a LOT more of them - and one of them is nightclub singer Sugarpuss O'Shea (Barbara Stanwyck); and very soon he becomes not only romantically involved with her, but also PRETTY unromantically with her gangster friends...One of the very FOREMOST examples of the classic screwball comedy, this movie is a perfect example for its genre from the first to the last minute; directing and writing are 'super-duper', as Professor Potts' helpers from the street would say - and the performances, EVERY single one of them, are simply outstanding: Cooper and Stanwyck, the mobsters with Dana Andrews and Dan Duryea as leaders, and of course the lovable elderly professors who are so much wrapped up with their work - until Sugarpuss brings a breath of fresh air into their lives! This is certainly one of the movies that everybody can watch over and over again without ever getting tired of it - and it's one of the most IDEAL movies for the purpose of bringing classic black-and-white movies which today's kids find 'old-fashioned' closer to them and awake an interest in classic cinema in them; a great masterpiece of comedy that will get generations to come to die laughing!!

GManfred This is a movie about 40's slang. Gary Cooper is an English professor, one of group of eight professors charged with compiling an encyclopedia and has come to realize that his compilation of contemporary slang is incomplete. From their cloistered abode he decides to go out among the proletariat and see how they talk. He recruits several candidates to meet in his study, and his recruitment efforts stop at Barbara Stanwyck, a nightclub singer named Sugarpuss O'Shea."Ball Of Fire", though somewhat dated, is great fun and part of it is recognizing all the old-fashioned slang expressions included in the script - a sparkling masterpiece written by the team of Chas. Brackett and Billy Wilder, who together wrote a slew of them. There are many comic characters in the cast, among them Richard Hadyn, S.Z. Sakall, Leonid Kinsky and Allen Jenkins.As you might expect, Barbara Stanwyck is the dynamic force that makes the picture go. It revolves around her, and also around Gary Cooper, but, as has been noted, he was limited and not as accomplished an actor as she was. But the contrast between her sassy, world-wise floozy and Cooper's nerdy bookworm is what makes this picture one of the best and it is a bridge between 30's screwball comedy and the more premeditated, cerebral brand of 40's comedy , exemplified by Preston Sturges's films.

David_Brown There is really nothing wrong with this film, from the directing to the acting, to the script. Spoilers Ahead: What makes this film work is the obvious chemistry between Stanwyck and Cooper, particularly in the scene in the bungalow where Potts (Cooper) confronts Sugarpuss (Stanwyck) with the truth that she essentially played him and the other professors for fools, and you see her face in the darkened room referring to herself as a tramp. If anyone has ever watched Stanwyck you know she is the kind of woman to quote Miss Bragg (Kathleen Howard) in this film "That causes the destruction of empires.", and for Stanwyck to give even an inch is unusual. Equally unusual is Cooper to end up with the kind of woman that is not ideal. In fact, of his films (That did not co-star Stanwyck They appeared 3 times together ) I can only think of 3 other times this happened. 1: "Desire" (Marlene Dietrich) 2: Vera Cruz (Sara Montiel), and 3: Along Came Jones (Loretta Young (A film very much like "Ball of Fire" with Young (Even more than Cooper) really cast against type). What really makes this film is the supporting cast, which is unusually strong: Allen Jenkins, Dan Duryea, Dana Andrews, Oskar Homolka, and Henry Travers. A special note goes to Gene Krupa who played "Drum Boogie" on a matchbook (He actually did it for fun, and it was later added to the film). If someone is a Cooper, and (or) a Stanwyck fan it should be a must see. If someone is unfamiliar with Stanwyck, and wants to see why she was great, this is an excellent place to start.

C L This story takes its viewers back to the days before advanced technology, back to the time when research came from slaving over dusty old volumes for hours on end. Eight peculiar professors spend nine years doing just that, fulfilling one deceased man's dream of compiling an exceptional encyclopedia. Absorbed by academia, they are unaware of the perks of street life until the handsome, yet naïve Bertram Potts (Gary Cooper) ventures out to research his article on slang. Opting to observe city life and its specimens, he invites an array of characters to the foundation to assist him in studying art of slang.His subject of interest for the project is the feisty Sugarpuss O'Shea (Barbara Stanwyck). The girlfriend of mob boss Joe Lilac (Dana Andrews), she uses the foundation to escape entanglement in Joe's murder charges. Almost immediately, she brings life to the foundation and its occupants. The clashing of the academic world with city life takes the viewers along for a ride of laughter, thrills, and more laughter. Gary Cooper did a fantastic job playing an egghead. His performance is charming and won my heart in more than one scene. Barbara Stanwyck portrayed the selfish club singer using others for her advantage, but she eventually softens. The real delights of the film were the seven elderly professors, particularly Richard Haydn whose comical one-liners and stuff-shirt demeanor keeps one laughing hysterically.This movie was by far one of the best I have seen for a long time, cleverly combining elements of comedy, romance, and drama.