Please don't let the low IMDb rating prevent you from enjoying the last Hardy Family film in which Andy is still a young (characteristically callow) fellow dealing with another romantic adventure after returning from military service in WWII. In fact, Rooney had served in the army with distinction, so aspects of the situation here parallel his real-life return to Hollywood. Although its storyline proves as intriguing as earlier dilemmas that Andy had faced, the dialogue is not quite as sparkling this time around. Perhaps the toning down was unavoidable in a badly-disquieted America so soon after the unspeakable horrors of NAZI and Japanese atrocities as well as the new terror of atomic warfare weighing heavily on audiences' minds. Rooney loved being a performer, and notwithstanding his rusty timing in the slapstick scenes such as when he locks himself out of the house on a freezing night in mid-winter, he still displays more charisma than a dozen other post-war young actors combined. Above all, he turns many serious conversations here that were potentially maudlin or dreary into genuinely involving moments. None of the Andy Hardy films were steeped in profundities. All the same, the Hardy Family saga propelled by its invariably strong supporting casts constitutes one of Hollywood's finest entertainments ---- and "LLAAH'" has improved with age to a greater extent than most of the entries in this series. Enjoy!

The Plot.Poor Andy, all he wants to do is get to town and continue to woo his girl and ask her hand in marriage. Andrew "Andy" Hardy met his sweetheart Kay Wilson in college, but has since served in the military and is now being discharged. Getting back to Kay may be the hardest thing of them all to accomplish. He arrives in town alright, but things start to go awry from there. Question is, will he succeed?DISCLAIMER: I never like the Andy Hardy series.First of all Andy's mother and father look like they are 80 years old a piece and Andy is supposed to be right out of the army -- so 20? 22 at most?now there's a miracle.The movie supposedly had a budget of a million bucks. I thought that was a lot but its about 13 million today so I suppose this was a low budget picture.The movie is rather bland and lifeless.

Let me say at once that any movie featuring Dorothy Ford is a good movie. This said, however, "Love Laughs…" is otherwise a waste of time. Mickey Rooney sleepwalks through a lot of boringly familiar routines and the direction by a gent named Willis Goldbeck can only be described as stodgy, clumsy and even deliberately flat-footed. Atrociously photographed by Robert Planck, Lewis Stone doesn't look the least bit like Andy's father – or even his grandfather. His great grandfather, yes – and with corny dialogue to fit. Director Goldbeck's decision to use lots of close-ups whenever Stone is in the camera's sights can only be described as a cardinal error. I'm not at all comfortable seeing a fine actor struggling to read a lot of dopey, inconsequential lines off an idiot board. Aside from this error – and it's a cardinal one – the movie serves up familiar routines with a certain amount of dash – and even expense. As I said at the start, it's a must-have for Dorothy Ford fans and it's available on a very good Mill Creek DVD.

In the last decades of his life, I came to dislike Mickey Rooney. This was based on what I heard about the man, which gave me the impression that he was a delusional, self-aggrandizing, and self promoting, jackass.However, I started to reevaluate him after I heard the director of Breakfast At Tiffany's say that he always regretted casting Rooney in that picture.I had always thought that Rooney did a great job as the Japanese clown character he created for Tiffany's. He seemed to me to be the perfect counterpoint to Hepburn's pseudo-sophisticated New Yorker character.Then tonight I saw Love Laughs at Andy Hardy (1946)and I was blown away by Rooney's command of the screen, and the poise he had in the character he created. The movie itself was just OK. But Rooney drew my attention in every frame he was in. For someone as young as he was in that movie, to have that kind of screen presence, really surprised me.There was a reason he was a big deal back in the day. There was a reason he was a big box office draw back in the day. I have a new found respect for the man who's shadows I see flicker away at me in those old movies.Tony