Cradle Snatchers on AllMovie

This first film version of the popular Russell Medcraft-Norma Mitchell stage farce The Cradle Snatchers is also one of the earliest directorial efforts of Howard Hawks. Tired of their husbands' philandering, three wealthy matrons decide to fight fire with fire by hiring three college boys to pose as their "young lovers." The boys do their job so well that, for a while, it looks like everybody's going to end up in divorce court. Fortunately, however, the wandering husbands see the error of their ways and return to their spouses. Long believed lost, The Cradle Snatchers was rediscovered by Howard Hawks aficionado Peter Bogdanovich in the mid-1970s; while only 5 1/2 reels of the 7-reel picture could be restored, it was enough to prove that even this early in the game, Hawks was a master farceur (interestingly, the original stage version of the play co-starred Humphrey Bogart, who later collaborated with Hawks on To Have and Have Not and The Big Sleep). The property was remade as the Broadway and Hollywood musical Let's Face It.