source: Who's Minding the Store?

Who's Minding the Store?

This is one of my favorite Jerry Lewis movies. The cast of characters are funny and talented. I especially enjoyed watching the very sexy secretary, Shirley Lott played by Francesca Bellini in her tight skirts, silk blouses and her gorgeous legs in high heels. Ms. Bellini's key scene was towards the end of the movie when clumsy Norman Phiffer, played by Jerry Lewis was repairing a vacuum cleaner and increased the suction to its highest power and then turned it on. As she got off the elevator with the vacuum out of control and pointed in her direction her skirt was sucked right off her body revealing her gorgeous legs encased only in dark brown silk stockings held up by a black lacey garter-belt over her pretty black panties. Embarrassed, she screamed and ran off to hide. This was Mr.Lewis's trademark in almost every movie where a woman would get her clothes ripped or torn off her to the delight of every male in the audience.

After THE DISORDERLY ORDERLY, this is Jerry Lewis's best film. Like DD, WMTS is directed by the great Frank Tashlin. The sight gags are hysterical, highlighted by a very funny fight between Lewis and a very aggressive vacuum cleaner. Nancy Kulp, herself a sight gag, is pretty amusing as a great white hunter. Lewis gets a terrific foil in shrewish department store owner Agnes Moorehead. Although Jill St. John is a bit harder to take as her daughter. She's insistent on being with Jerry and that's tough to digest. Lewis usually kept his leading ladies to the Ina Balin type...semi-ingenues who would believably be smitten with him. Nevertheless, the movie is terrific with the now famous typewriter gag.

Everyone talks about Jerry Lewis films such as "The Nutty Professor","The Geisha Boy",and others.But no one hardly talks about "Who's Minding The Store?"which IMHO,is his most underrated movie ever!Jerry is so funny in this film,you would have thought the Three Stooges should have been in it! The other reason I love this film:Francesca Bellini,who plays Shirley the pretty secretary who wears the very tight skirts.Agnes Moorehead & Ray Walston are great in their respective roles as well,but the climax of the movie will have you rolling with laughter!

Not my Favorite J.L. Film, (that would be Errand Boy), but delightful, nonetheless. Great physical comedy and some lightweight satire ("a man has to be king of his own ranch style tract home"). The woman who played Jane Hathaway in Beverly Hillbillies makes a cameo appearance as a Big Game Hunter looking for a new rifle in the Sporting Dept., where Jerry's Character is working the counter. The usual slapstick devices come into play such as the golf bag sch tick (you know, the one), the golf ball going out the window...making, let's just say..multiple bounces along its journey, and of course. The exercise bicycles on the mattress, and ensuing endurance jog make my side hurt with laughter. Home sick from work or school, either from a cold or the bad ironic humor that pervades your weekdays? This is your film. If you don't like Jerry, you have no soul.

Jerry Lewis plays Norman Phiffier, a poodle dog walker who is going to marry a rich girl named Barbara Tuttle (Jill St. John) who works as an elevator operator at a department store.Barbara doesn't want Norman to know that she's rich.Barbara's mother Phoebe Tuttle (Agnes Moorehead) doesn't want her daughter to marry such a fool as Norman so she gets Norman a job from the store Barbara works and gets him the worst jobs.Norman has to eat fried ants for example.Frank Tashlin's Who's Minding the Store from 1963 is filled with hilarious situations.Jerry Lewis causes disasters and makes people crack up.It's hard to say the best movie of Jerry Lewis but this must be one of the them.It has everything Jerry Lewis fans need.Watch this movie if you want to get a good laugh a'la Jerry Lewis.