BEFORE: I think that after today's film I'm halfway through the (M)Archie Madness tournament of Cary Grant films - I'm due to finish well before that silly series of college basketball games, anyway. Plus I don't have to fill out any brackets or worry about how far Gonzaga will go this year - so I like my choice of pastime much better.
THE PLOT: An escaped prisoner and a stuffy law professor vie for the hand of a spirited schoolteacher.
AFTER: These past few Cary Grant films have all featured legal issues - we had a female judge setting him up with her sister in "The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer", and last night's film concerned itself with whether it's legal to poison your house's tenants (absolutely not). Tonight the third member of the usual love triangle is a prominent legal expert, and he's up for a possible chair on the Supreme Court, if he can only keep his name out of the press while he rents a house in a New England town. But as you might expect, that becomes impossible, since he rented a house where an escaped convict is hiding in the attic.
This is not your typical town, however, it's ruled by a corrupt judge and mayor, who determine the outcomes of trials before they've seen all the evidence. So it's very possible that the oddly-named Leopold Dilj (Grant) is being convicted of arson and murder without some key elements, like, say, a body. The more normally named Clyde Bracken is absent, and only an athletic medal of his was found in the rubble of the old mill. I couldn't possibly imagine that he dropped it there himself, while setting the fire and then heading out for parts unknown. Nah, couldn't be.
Dilj eventually reveals himself (because even a hiding convict needs to eat) and passes himself off as the gardener, which gives him a chance to debate the finer points of law with a Supreme Court nominee. The goal is to convince him that the law is not just paper or a set of ideas, it's a tangible work in progress that affects people's lives on a daily basis. And that if it's not properly applied, well, then the law is an ass.
The plot seems to reflect some of the early Hitchcock films like "Saboteur" and "The 39 Steps", only without as much going on the run to find the real villain, and more sitting around the house debating the finer points of the legal system.
The love triangle feels really tacked-on here, it feels like people fall in love just because they're near each other, and that just doesn't explain things well enough for me. What makes an erudite professor have feelings for a simple schoolteacher who can't take dictation, can't get his fried eggs on to his breakfast plate, and can't even leave the house without slamming the door? Also, she talks like an early inspiration for Lois Griffin from "Family Guy".
NITPICK POINT: I can maybe imagine the professor's black butler getting teary-eyed seeing him in his judge's robes - after all, this was made back when being on the Supreme Court meant something - but when he shaves off his beard? That seems like a bit of a stretch. Did his manservant have some kind of emotional attachment to his facial hair? I'm not seeing a connection here.
Also starring Jean Arthur (last seen in "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town"), Ronald Colman (last seen in "Around the World in Eighty Days"), Edgar Buchanan, Don Beddoe, Rex Ingram, George Watts, Tom Tyler, Glenda Farrell, with a cameo from Lloyd Bridges (last seen in "Honey, I Blew Up the Kid").
RATING: 4 out of 10 spinning newspaper headlines
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