The Bank Dick
| The Bank Dick | |
|---|---|
| File:WC Fields.gif The Bank Dick film poster | |
| Directed by | Edward F. Cline |
| Written by | W.C. Fields |
| Starring | W.C. Fields |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release dates |  November 29, 1940 April 3, 1941 |
Running time | 72 min. |
| Language | English |
The Bank Dick (released as The Bank Detective in the United Kingdom) is a 1940 comedy film in which W. C. Fields plays a character who trips a bank robber and ends up a security guard as a result. In addition to bank and family scenes, it features Fields pretending to be a film director and ends in a chaotic car chase. The Bank Dick is considered a classic of his work, incorporating his usual persona as a drunken henpecked husband with a shrewish wife, disapproving mother-in-law, and savage children.
The film was written by Fields, using the alias Mahatma Kane Jeeves ("My hat, my cane, Jeeves!"), and directed by Edward F. Cline. Shemp Howard, one of the Three Stooges, plays a bartender.
Famous scenes
- The family frequently mentions Fields' smoking while upstairs in his room, a fact which he tries to hide. In one scene, Fields comes downstairs and hears them mention his smoking, he uses a quick movement of his lips to "fold" the still-burning cigarette into his mouth so that he can walk out unmolested.
- Fields says to a capped bottle of whiskey "Take off your hat in the presence of a gentleman."
- Fields: "Was I in here last night, and did I spend a 20 dollar bill?"
- Shemp: "Yeah!"
- Fields: "Boy, is that a load off my mind. (chuckles) I thought I'd lost it!"
- Upon hearing that his daughter is dating a bank teller named "Og Oggilby", Fields remarks, "Og Oggilby; sounds like bubbles in a bathtub!"
- Fields incoherently repeats a con-artist's sales pitch for the 'Beefsteak Mine' thus: "Ten cents a share. Telephone sold for five cents a share. How would you like something better for ten cents a share? If five will get you ten, ten will get you twenty. Beautiful home in the country, upstairs and down. Beer flowing through the estate over your grandmother's paisley shawl." By the end of the film, it turns out to be a sound investment after all, his family adores him, he lives a life of luxury and everyone lives happily ever after.
Awards and recognition
The film has been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.
