Film IX
IX: George Stevens, Penny Serenade (1941)
This is one of those moments when reading strategies become interesting. The classic form of the romantic comedy is one where two characters start out by not liking each other very much, bicker like nobody's business, but eventually realise, yanno. Think Beatrice and Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing. Think Grant and Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby. But there's a second type, the comedy of remarriage, in which two characters split up, having decided they dislike each other, they bicker like nobody's business, but eventually realise, yanno. The Awful Truth and My Favorite Wife both follow this pattern. So I assumed the same would be true of the third of the Dunne/Grant collaborations.
Julie Gardiner Adams (Dunne) is closing up her house and preparing to leave town, when she starts playing a pile of records from her marriage album. The split has happened - is she really sure? asks Applejack Carney (Edgar Buchanan). This is clearly the last chance - clearly Roger Adams (Grant) can win her round. Then a series of flashbacks commence, each linked to a record.
Roger first meets Julie when she works in a music shop, and we see his first awkward efforts at courtship. Slightly absent minded, perhaps, but a journalist rather than a reporter. We know the world of journalism is full of snappiness (see His Girl Friday/The Front Page), so be prepared for much dialogue. No - he's been posted to Japan; she falls in love behind his back? No, she follows, pregnant, but she is seriously injured in an earthquake.
Back in Smalltown USA, Roger buys a paper and they decide to adopt, lying about their income in the process. Someone from the agency drops round and see Julie dancing (well recovered then) in cleaning lady garb. So Dunne comically pretends to be the cleaning lady, thus proving their wealth.
Er, no. She is recognised. In An Awful Truth it would have been virtuoso confusion of who is who.
And from here the film is darker and darker - it is melodrama not rom com. They adopt a child, but clearly something nasty is foreshadowed: there's a tense scene as I expected the worst, but the disaster is actually handled with a good deal of clumsiness. It's almost as if they set out to wrong foot - but does explain the flashback.
The rules aren't abandoned altogether; it's not quite a deus ex machina, but status quos are restored. And the economics be damned. A good film - but not what I'd expected.
Like a number of films this is in the Public Domain, and my DVD was a cheap edition with a very poor transfer. This includes jumps, as well as film stock. It also claims to be Approx. 75 Min. - in fact it comes in at just under two hours.
Totals: 9 [Cinema: 3; DVD: 6; TV: 0]
I have Holiday and Walk, Don't Run next on the Sofa list. Maybe I need a break from Mr Grant and need to watch more Curb Your Enthusiasm first.
This is one of those moments when reading strategies become interesting. The classic form of the romantic comedy is one where two characters start out by not liking each other very much, bicker like nobody's business, but eventually realise, yanno. Think Beatrice and Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing. Think Grant and Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby. But there's a second type, the comedy of remarriage, in which two characters split up, having decided they dislike each other, they bicker like nobody's business, but eventually realise, yanno. The Awful Truth and My Favorite Wife both follow this pattern. So I assumed the same would be true of the third of the Dunne/Grant collaborations.
Julie Gardiner Adams (Dunne) is closing up her house and preparing to leave town, when she starts playing a pile of records from her marriage album. The split has happened - is she really sure? asks Applejack Carney (Edgar Buchanan). This is clearly the last chance - clearly Roger Adams (Grant) can win her round. Then a series of flashbacks commence, each linked to a record.
Roger first meets Julie when she works in a music shop, and we see his first awkward efforts at courtship. Slightly absent minded, perhaps, but a journalist rather than a reporter. We know the world of journalism is full of snappiness (see His Girl Friday/The Front Page), so be prepared for much dialogue. No - he's been posted to Japan; she falls in love behind his back? No, she follows, pregnant, but she is seriously injured in an earthquake.
Back in Smalltown USA, Roger buys a paper and they decide to adopt, lying about their income in the process. Someone from the agency drops round and see Julie dancing (well recovered then) in cleaning lady garb. So Dunne comically pretends to be the cleaning lady, thus proving their wealth.
Er, no. She is recognised. In An Awful Truth it would have been virtuoso confusion of who is who.
And from here the film is darker and darker - it is melodrama not rom com. They adopt a child, but clearly something nasty is foreshadowed: there's a tense scene as I expected the worst, but the disaster is actually handled with a good deal of clumsiness. It's almost as if they set out to wrong foot - but does explain the flashback.
The rules aren't abandoned altogether; it's not quite a deus ex machina, but status quos are restored. And the economics be damned. A good film - but not what I'd expected.
Like a number of films this is in the Public Domain, and my DVD was a cheap edition with a very poor transfer. This includes jumps, as well as film stock. It also claims to be Approx. 75 Min. - in fact it comes in at just under two hours.
Totals: 9 [Cinema: 3; DVD: 6; TV: 0]
I have Holiday and Walk, Don't Run next on the Sofa list. Maybe I need a break from Mr Grant and need to watch more Curb Your Enthusiasm first.