Verity Robins Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Lachlan Coulson This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Francene Odetta It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Antonius Block Cary Grant believes he overplayed his character in 'Arsenic and Old Lace', and I agree, he's over-the-top. At times his frantic jumping around and shocked facial expressions are funny, such as when he tells his aunts early on that they really oughtn't to be poisoning their visitors by saying "Look, you can't do things like that! Now, I don't know how I can explain this to you, but it's not only against the law, its wrong! It's not a nice thing to do. People wouldn't understand. He wouldn't understand. What I mean is, well, this is developing into a very bad habit!" … all while hunched over and gesticulating. This is a loud movie, with one brother believing he's Teddy Roosevelt yelling 'Charge!' as he runs up the stairs and slams his bedroom door repeatedly, characters rapidly entering scenes in a pell-mell confusion of trying to hide bodies, threaten each other, commit others to mental institutions, etc etc. It's also all over the map. At first I thought Capra may have threaded the needle and been able to deliver both a dark comedy and a drama, since Raymond Massey's glowering and Peter Lorre's simpering are quite sinister, and a nice counterpart to Cary Grant and the sweet old ladies played so wonderfully by Josephine Hull and Jean Adair. However, the movie dragged on, and was far too long at 118 minutes. Some may like the madcap frenzy Capra created based on the stage play, and I have to say there are some nice moments and lines ("Insanity runs in my family. It practically gallops."), but overall the movie gets to be a little much, and doesn't stand the test of time, at least for me.

tavm Having first watched this 20 years ago, I saw this again recently on TCM at a friend's house in Katy, Texas. It's still quite hilarious seeing Cary Grant playing a character who discovers a couple of relatives doing something not quite legal with some visitors. I know he thought his performance was one of his least believable in the film but I thought he acquitted himself quite well with the rest of the cast. I also know about Boris Karloff being the originator of the role of Jonathan and his being the one who was most suitable to play it because of the in-joke of his character's resemblance to him, but Raymond Massey taking over was still pretty funny enough especially with Peter Lorre playing alongside him. Frank Capra did very well adapting this stage comedy to the screen so kudos to him for taking the assignment. Anyway, that's a high recommendation for Arsenic and Old Lace. P.S. Since I'd always like to cite when players from my favorite movie-Capra's It's a Wonderful Life-are in others, here it's Charles Lane as one of the reporters in the beginning of the movie and Gary Owen as the cab driver Grant keeps avoiding who eventually appeared in that particular classic-as the guy who says to Potter he may eventually work for George Bailey and the person who helps Bert the Cop decorate the Baileys' honeymoon suite, respectively-I always like to watch every year during December.

Emma Faulkner Arsenic and old lace is one of my all time favorite movies. I saw the movie when I was a kid one halloween and just fell in love. That was my first time seeing a Cary Grant film and he quickly became one of my favorite actors for old movies. My aunt did the play when she was in college so I was always familiar with the story. But the movie brought it more to life to me.Cary Grant was hilarious as usual and probably played the best performance I have seen him do. His facial expressions and the way he acted because he was so perplexed to learn that his aunts were murders was hilarious. But I think my favorite character in the movie might be the man who thought he was Teddy Roosevelt, I used to laugh so hard at the scenes of him running up the stairs every time yelling, "Charge." The whole movie was just wonderfully done and shot very smoothly. And the fact that its a comedy/ thriller that is usually on t.v. every Halloween makes it all the better to me.This movie had everything you could possibly in a comedy, great and funny characters, a Thriller, and crime film, a bit of a funny love story. I would definitely recommend this movie to people who love a good comedy/ thriller. There are no other movies like this film and you do not wanna miss an amazing performance by Cary Grant.

Python Hyena Arsenic and Old Lace (1944): Dir: Frank Capra / Cast: Cary Grant, Priscilla Lane, Josephine Hull, Jean Adair, Raymond Massey: Overrated piece of junk that looks like something Frank Capra shat out of his ass after having made worthy films like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and It Happened One Night. Well, what happened one night is this sh*t was conjured up and labeled as a classic. It stars Cary Grant who goes hopelessly over the top as a newly wed whose two nut job aunts mercy kill lonely men by poisoning their wine. Grant discovers a body in the window seat that Capra was too cheap to actually show the audience because apparently this garbage is a comedy. Apparently everyone in this house belongs in an insane asylum. His brother thinks he is Teddy Roosevelt and yells, "Charge!" He barges up the stairs about fifty times to the point where a well placed trap door would have been appreciated. Then we have Raymond Massey and Peter Lorre as villains who resemble Frankenstein and Igor in performances best left on the cutting room floor. The worst scene has Grant tied to a chair while some half wit cop fails to see the obvious, and this goes on and on until the viewer goes as mad as the characters. Pointless drivel with production values that resemble a cheap stage play and characters that are complete morons. This film should be laced with gasoline and a match. Score: 1 / 10