Hat, Coat, and Glove

"Hat, Coat and Glove" is a film that really strains credibility--so much so that the only way to enjoy it is to turn off your brain and not question things that seem too coincidental to be believable. However, despite this, IF you can put aside your brain for a few minutes, the film is rather entertaining.

Ricardo Cortez plays a very erudite lawyer--but one whose marriage is all but over. In fact, he and his wife haven't lived together for some time and she's already got a new boyfriend. However, and here where it gets goofy, when Cortez goes to have it out with this boyfriend (because he still wants a reconciliation with his wife), he isn't home but a crazy lady is there. This unstable woman has a history of suicide attempts and when she is talking to Cortez, she starts behaving irrationally and ends up getting shot when Cortez was pulling the gun away from her. But, Cortez doesn't call the police--and soon they arrest the boyfriend and think he murdered the woman. Cortez knows it was NOT murder but decides to exploit the situation. He agrees to defend the boyfriend IF his wife agrees to return! However, through the course of the trial, the wife starts to notice that some of the evidence seems to point to her husband! How all this ended, though, really confused me--especially what the wife did when she realized the truth. Baffling to say the least.

None of this is particularly believable....none. But, Cortez was enjoyable to watch and the film was enjoyable. HOWEVER, my favorite part involved seeing if a glove found at the site belonged to the boyfriend--and a Johnny Cochran moment at the OJ trial came to mind. It was, in so many ways, like the script that Cochran used! Pretty funny...

I've always been a Ricardo Cortez fan. He rarely gets a chance to stretch his acting wings but he does so here. Cortez is exceptional in playing older men. In Torrent (1926) you'd swear he actually aged. In Hat, Coat and Glove he plays age, hopelessness and loneliness quite well. It is unfortunate that the effect is damaged by shoddy makeup. His graying hair varies between scenes and virtually disappears in some. Dorothy Burgess was never better. The wife and her lover are somewhat weak. Frankly, I didn't see what the husband or lover saw in her. But it didn't matter; this is Cortez's film. The twists and turns of the plot are anything but conventional. For all it's absurdities this is a quality programmer that will hold your interest.

This is an interesting film, somewhat of a departure for Ricardo Cortez from the dapper ladies man he generally portrayed in films of this period. He is a dreamer, a man who has been in love, is divorced, but is still in love with his wife. He also has to endure the reality of his 'ex' and a younger man who are now doing 'light housekeeping'. The script's OK, not great, but economical and to the point. Cortez is a lawyer who must defend his ex-wife's present lover on a murder rap, and does so against his better wishes. But he knows a lot more about the murder charge than he lets on. This flick came on late at night in the city, and the station cut the tail end of the flick so I couldn't comment on the end...because I ain't seen it. They gave the film short shrift, which is a drag. However, knowing the Hayes code of the period, I am almost certain that I could write the ending without having seen it, and it wouldn't be too terribly far removed from the ending that I did not see, thanks to the neglect of the local TV station. Be that as it may, the part I saw was slightly above average for 'B' film fare of the period.

Ricardo Cortez had been around for YEARS in the silent films... here he co-stars with Barbara Robbins, as husband and wife, Robert and Dorothea. When HE finds out that SHE's seeing other men ( we ARE still pre-code, so its ok to show this for another year or so...), then the poop hits the fan! Cortez is very happy, relaxed, ethereal. almost ghostly throughout. doesn't seem that upset over anything that happens. the wife is seeing the younger Jerry (John Beal), who is also seeing another girl of his own. keep an eye out for Margaret Hamilton in the courtroom, WAAAYYY before Wizard of OZ! the story moves pretty slowly. Cortez had been a pretty big name in the late 1920s and the 1930s, but he has a pretty cardboard performance in this one. very average for the time. When someone turns up dead, attorney Robert must figure out exactly what's going on. Directed by Worth Miner, one of the first things he had directed. and he only directed nine films. It's entertaining... very typical courtroom case from the 1930s. Very soon, the film code would come rushing in, and everything would be hot cocoa and marshmallows. Hamilton is the most exciting part of this one. ends on a strange note.. a bit anti-climactic.

This film is extremely weak in all categories, particularly acting and screenplay. As a courtroom drama, it is downright pitiful. An attorney is involved in a murder; it was an accidental shooting but the attorney could well have been a suspect. He agrees to represent the defendant in the case without disclosing his own involvement. Moreover, the defendant has to agree to forego his alibi because he was with the lawyer's wife (from whom the lawyer was then separated) at the time of the killing. The trial itself is absurd with such nonsense as the prosecutor calling the defendant as a witness and expert witnesses popping up in the courtroom and volunteering to testify. Although there is a glove scene which is amusingly like the O.J. Simpson case (in this case, the glove fits both the defendant and the defendant's lawyer), there is nothing else amusing or worthwhile about this film. Originally a B movie, it rates a D minus.