BEFORE: Fulfilled my annual spring equinox ritual by shaving off my winter beard, and in honor of Ronald Colman's scene in "The Talk of the Town", this year I made sure my trusty manservant was on hand to witness it - damned if the sight didn't bring a tear to his eye, imagine that. I guess now I'm ready to reconsider my positions on the American legal system.
I think that's it for Cary Grant's screwball comedies, so that means I've entered the third round of (M)Archie Madness, let's call these the "oldies". One more week of the tournament to go. Yes, I realize I didn't hold true to reverse chronological order, this film was released in 1939 and "The Awful Truth" came out in 1937 - but I wanted to keep the three Irene Dunne films together, and they all sort of riffed on the same theme, so I stand by that decision.
THE PLOT: While out riding in the country, wealthy New Yorker Alec Walker meets young widow Julie Eden, and a relationship quickly develops. However, Alec has not told her that he is already locked into a loveless marriage to the avaricious Maida.
AFTER: Cary Grant and his leading lady? Check. Love triangle with legal complications? Check. Screwball antics? No way, not here. And when you take the comedy out of the situation, it seems we're just left with sentiment - love and caring, but also infidelity, back-stabbing and serious illness.
Is it me, or did Cary Grant's characters always have something going on the side? In this film he's got a wife and a few ex-girlfriends, and still he starts up a new relationship. He and his wife seem to have some sort of understanding, however, as long as he comes home to her and she gets to live a life of luxury, she's willing to look the other way, believing that his flings will burn themselves out after about a year, maximum, and he'll come back to her.
But when the latest girlfriend seems like a keeper, the wife goes off on holiday with her in-laws, saying she'll break the news about the impending divorce, but really planning to pitch herself to them as the ideal, one-and-only mate, and poisoning their minds against their son's new love. It's another case where a character is afraid of having a five-minute conversation, and it costs them weeks, or months, of personal growth. The resulting situation also manages to fill up about 30 minutes of screen time, but it's maddening for a viewer who realizes there was a better way to handle things.
I wonder how many viewers in 1939 rooted for the wife, even though she was portrayed as the conniving gold-digger. Some people would no doubt champion the cause of marriage even to the point of making both of its participants miserable, and couldn't imagine rooting for the adulterous affair to win out. And while it's obvious that the wife's love needed to be depicted as "not real" or impure in order to justify the adulterous relationship with regards to the production code, it's still amazing that this one got by the censors, since it portrays a couple living in sin, but being very happy together.
Also starring Carole Lombard (last seen in "Mr. & Mrs. Smith"), Kay Francis, Charles Coburn (last seen in "The Paradine Case"), Nella Walker, Helen Vinson, Katharine Alexander (last seen in "Now, Voyager").
RATING: 4 out of 10 garden parties
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