Hellen I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Doomtomylo a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Mathilde the Guild Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Spikeopath Cheaper by the Dozen is directed by Walter Lang and is based on the book of the same name written by Frank Gilbreth Jr. and Ernestine Gilbreth Carey. It stars Clifton Webb, Myrna Loy, Jeanne Crain, Betty Lynn and Edgar Buchanan. Story follows the Gilbreth family and how they grow up living in their new home in Montclair, New Jersey. Headed by father Frank (Webb), he and his wife Lillian (Loy), have a brood of twelve, six of either sex. Being a time and motion expert, Frank likes the family home to be run in an efficient and time saving manner, but the times are a changing and the big question is if Frank can change with the times; particularly as his eldest daughter, Ann (Crain) is about to blossom into a woman.Very much a frustrating watch, Cheaper by the Dozen was a film that I could quite easily have walked out on at the half way point. Yet come the intriguing finale I was ultimately glad I saw it thru to the end. The first half of the film is very episodic, in fact it's a series of episodes strung together seemingly to show how anal Frank is. There's no character development for the other members of the family, with Loy serving only as someone who holds the baby and lets Frank rule the house with military like precision. Which might be somebody's idea of fun, but I found it all rather flat. But then once Mildred Natwick arrives for a quite delightful sequence about birth control, the film breaks free of its annoying shackles as Lamar Trotti's screenplay provides scope for narrative development.You sense, too, that Webb is relieved to not be the sole centre of attention, for his performance improves and the comedy starts to flow more naturally. He's helped enormously by the plot strand (and I use that in a very loose way) that sees Crain (bright as a button) get centre stage as the eldest daughter starting to eye the men and show signs of rebellion. Some good scenes follow, with a chaperon centre piece very engaging and humorous, but then a turn of events comes out of the blue and gives off a confused message. The film appears to say that by Frank cutting loose and enjoying life a bit more, costs him his life! It would have been better if he had stayed as the one track thinking hypocrite he was, while banging the drum for male superiority in the home. As I said earlier, it's intriguing, but not all that clear what all involved in the story want to say.A mixed bag, then, but entertaining regardless of its staid first half and its ambiguous outcome. 7/10

writers_reign ... half a dozen of the other, an apt description of a family boasting six girls and six boys. It's almost inevitable that after the first couple of reels you find yourself thinking of Life With Father and Meet Me In St Louis, both set in a similar period, featuring large families with colourful matriarchs and episodic rather than linear. I doubt that many feel-good family films of the fifties would have dared to end with the death - albeit off-screen - of the leading character so that's another brownie point to a well-made, sentimental movie. By today's - or even by those of the time - standards not a lot happens, instead we are treated to several vignettes of family life just as the twentieth century was gearing up to ride roughshod over the Edwardian era. Webb is excellent in the lead and though woefully underused Myrna Loy registers strongly as his patient and loving wife. A delightful diversion.

Neil Doyle CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN is based on the true life experiences of a family with a dozen children, although when watching the film you have to suspect that some of these "events" were embellished for the sake of laughs rather than accuracy. And Clifton Webb, in stiff collar and still bossing everyone around, reminds one of Mr. Belevedere with a family.Still, he's the main reason for watching this highly sentimental illusion of what family life was like in America in the early 20th century. The film itself is no more than a series of vignettes, just glimpses of humorous minor events that happened in a family where the father ruled the roost while the mother (MYRNA LOY) took care of the children and her husband, not necessarily in that order.MYRNA LOY and JEANNE CRAIN (as the oldest daughter), don't have much to do and Crain is a bit simpering and coy in a role she was really too old to play. But most of the kids have some good moments and it's all over in a brisk 86 minutes, so no need to squabble about too many dull moments.If you like CLIFTON WEBB as an eccentric and overbearing efficiency expert, you'll get a lot of amusement from this one.

Steve Haynie I bought the DVD of Cheaper By The Dozen months before watching it. The movie was part of a larger number of old movies that I was working through. Part of the reason for putting it aside was that in order to appreciate some movies you have to be in the right frame of mind.Knowing that Cheaper By The Dozen was made shortly after World War II, it was expected that the family's values would reflect Hollywood's "perfect" world of that era. The truth is, many families strove for that level of obedience and order. With the story set in the 1920's and the nature of Mr. Gilbreth, there was another level of family structure that may seem odd today. Instead of watching the movie randomly, I chose a time at which I could think in terms of the real Gilbreth family and their environment. I had to bring myself to the level of the movie instead of waiting for the movie to draw me in.Having recently been taught a little about how efficiency managers view manufacturing processes, I could understand the character of Frank Gilbreth much better. They really do look for ways to save ten seconds here and twenty seconds there. At the end of the day minutes or hours are saved, which translates into more product output. Seeing Gilbreth apply his morals and industrial efficiency techniques on keeping order within his household is what makes this movie funny. I admire Mr. and Mrs. Gilbreth for their thoughtful parental guidance.