I've Got Your Number

This one looks like it was originally planned as another inexpensive vehicle for Cagney, like THE PICTURE SNATCHER (in which he played a photographer) or TAXI!: ordinary Joe roles that the men in the audience could identify with, and when Jimmy snaps into action, they can imagine themselves doing it. After all, what's he got that I don't? But he again threatened to walk, so they tried O'Brien out in the role. He's an Irish sort of actor too. Maybe the audience won't notice.

Unfortunately, I noticed and it became something of a chore to make my way through this movie when the top-billed actor doesn't get much screen time. As often happens in lesser Warner Bs, it's the supporting players that kept me watching, particularly Eugene Palette. But you can skip this one.

While I must admit that I enjoyed watching "I've Got Your Number", I must also admit that the film had serious flaws. First off, Pat O'Brien's character was a real pig--a sexual harassing jerk. Second, the plot was a bit silly.

This film begins with O'Brien working as a telephone repair man. He is good at his job but he's also a pig--and sexually harasses his clients repeatedly. With one woman, he slaps her on the behind. With another (Joan Blondell), he's a bit of a stalker--a guy who won't accept 'no' for an answer. Back in 1934, he might have been seen as a cute fellow--today he would have been arrested! And, true to the ridiculous attitudes of the day, he was the hero--a guy who really was NOT very heroic. To make it worse, after sexually harassing Bondell repeatedly, she responded by falling in love with the guy!!! Today, it's a seriously screwed up relationship to say the least.

Overall, this is a film that IS enjoyable but also seriously flawed and stupid. Worth seeing if you love classic Hollywood--otherwise it might just seem trivial and silly.

Phone company technicians Pat O'Brien and Allen Jenkins charge into a luxurious apartment populated by lounging ladies. They exchange insults, they install a longer phone cord, they exchange a few suggestive phone cord jokes as they finish the job. O'Brien slaps one of the women on the rear on his way out. –These phone repair guys are fast, tough and too cool for rules.

O'Brien's swagger gets him into trouble with boss Eugene Palette ("I was gonna slap her on the shoulder and she bent over," he says) but in the next scene he's performing a daring rescue atop a burning building and is proclaimed a hero. Ah, the life of a telephone technician: excitement, glamour and adventure—at least according to this picture.

Joan Blondell co-stars as a switchboard operator who gets innocently mixed up in an office swindle. Accused of theft, she takes it on the lam…and guess who sets out to rescue her by tracking down and trapping the real crooks?

Glenda Farrell is hilarious as "Madame Francis, Spiritualist Medium." Using her office phone system to run phony séances, Glenda is busted by our heroes—who then start hanging out with her.

The four stars are all highly entertaining (although Farrell's role is regrettably minor). The plot may be somewhat predictable—O'Brien and Jenkins use their tools and phone skills to track the crooks, tap their calls, learn their plans—but it moves fast and packs plenty of attitude.

It's never especially believable but awfully hard to resist.

A harried switchboard operator & a ditzy medium get involved with a couple of brash telephone repairmen & a dangerous gang of thieves...

I'VE GOT YOUR NUMBER was the sort of ephemeral comic frippery which the Hollywood studios produced almost without effort during the 1930's. Well made & highly enjoyable, Depression audiences couldn't seem to get enough of these popular, funny photo dramas.

Joan Blondell & Glenda Farrell are perfectly cast as the fast -talking female leads. Although Joan gets both top billing and the romantic scenes, - and they share no screen time together in this early pairing - both gals are as talented & watchable as they are gorgeous.

Pat O'Brien, obnoxiously cocky & self assured, appears as Blondell's persistent suitor. Whether tapping wires or tackling crooks, he is equally jaunty. Behind him comes a small parade of character actors - Allen Jenkins, Eugene Pallette, Henry O'Neill, Hobart Cavanaugh, Louise Beavers - all equally adept at delighting an audience.

Much of the dialogue & plot development indicates this film made it just under the wire before the imposition of the Production Code.

While never stars of the first rank, Joan Blondell (1906-1979) & Glenda Farrell (1904-1971) enlivened scores of films at Warner Bros. throughout the 1930's, especially the eight in which they appeared together. Whether playing gold diggers or working girls, reporters or secretaries, these blonde & brassy ladies were very nearly always a match for whatever leading man was lucky enough to share equal billing alongside them. With a wisecrack or a glance, their characters showed they were ready to take on the world - and any man in it. Never as wickedly brazen as Paramount's Mae West, you always had the feeling that, tough as they were, Blondell & Farrell used their toughness to defend vulnerable hearts ready to break over the right guy. While many performances from seven decades ago can look campy or contrived today, these two lovely ladies are still spirited & sassy.

.. like Joan's dependable sassiness and some funny bits from Allen Jenkins, but this isn't a DVD I'd put under anyone's Christmas tree. The plot, very briefly, revolves around Joan as a switchboard operator who is used (more than once) to help someone else commit a crime, and Pat O'Brien is a phone line repairman who (separately) becomes involved with her.

O'Brien's character is a sleaze, to say the least. We see early on that he treats women like samples in a meat market, but once he sets his sights on Joan, he goes all out, first insulting and bullying her into giving him a tumble, then eventually overturning her dining table so her dinner will be ruined and she'll then let him take her to a restaurant! (I kid not...) Joan gives as good as she gets, of course, but inexplicably, his boorish behavior wears her down and she falls in love with him. Okay, I realize this was made in the 1930s, but really!

As mentioned, I liked Allen Jenkins and his comic moments, one with a bogus palm reader (the great Louise Beavers), another when he's needed to listen in on dirty dealings by phone, and while there is mayhem going on he is there, fast asleep! His frequent delivery of the line, "Let's get outta here!!" in an exasperated voice is funny and doesn't get old.

Thumbs up to Eugene Pallette's performance, too. He sees O'Brien for the worm that he is and isn't shy about expressing it. I'd recommend it mainly for brassy Joan Blondell.