Maybe It's Love

Do yourself a favor. When this movie comes on, don't watch it, just save it. Then fast forward to about 15 or 20 minutes into the film, when Joan Bennett falls out of a canoe and climbs out of the water. Watch the one minute or so when she stands on the shore, soaking wet and apparently underwear-less in a clinging and largely transparent white dress. Then erase the movie. You've seen the best that this film has to offer.

I love Joe E. Brown, but he was a work in progress when this film was made. He greatly overdoes his loud, siren-like voice, and his slapstick is broad and unsubtle. All of the acting is wooden and stiff. And the gimmick of using real all-star football players in the cast certainly didn't add to the overall acting quality.

The script is nearly devoid of any actually funny lines, and the romantic "tension" that is supposed to develop isn't at all dramatic or interesting. There's not a bit of chemistry between the two actors who are supposed to fall in love. If you are a Joe E. Brown fan, he's made much better films. Although if you are a Joan Bennett fan, I have to admit, her other films probably never showed her off in quite the same way...

A prestige college uses a co-ed's wiles to entice top football players to enroll so that the college can finally beat its long-time rival.

I suspect the main interest now in this slender concoction are the 1920's college All-Americans. Note that all are white, and one even plays sans helmet, the better to show off his mop of blond hair, I guess. Comedic moments are supplied by irrepressible Joe E. Brown, whose gaping mouth may scare little kids, but with enough nimble moves to match an acrobat. Then there's budding star Joan Bennett showing it all beneath a wet dress-- move over, Playboy. No wonder Edward G. Robinson chased her happily to his near doom in Woman In The Window (1944). Too bad about leading man James Hall. He's not much of an actor and apparently drank himself to death at only age 40 (IMDB). Not much to recommend with this antique, except for Brown and Bennett clearly on their way up the Hollywood ladder.

Along with the extraordinary output of William Wellman -- "Public Enemy, "Wings," "Wild Boys on the Road," "A Star is Born" and so forth -- there are a number of fairly ordinary entertainment films such as the studio would have wanted made. "Eleven Men and a Girl" -- which is the title I saw it under -- is one of them, a college football comedy played by Joan Bennett, Joe E. Brown and a squad of non-acting football players drawn from the ranks of the top teams of the two previous seasons. There are several visual touches that drive this above the purely ordinary, such as a graph of a football field, with positions indicated, each marked by a photo of the heroine (Bennett), whose gentle scheme is to get all of the fellas to believe that they have a sweetheart in her order to pump them up to greatness, as per George Ade's play "The College Widow," already filmed twice before. As the camera moves along the photos, cutaways are used to show the boys practicing hard, striving to make their game better. The film is dominated, however, by rubber-faced comedian Joe E. Brown, and this picture was important in establishing his popularity among film goers, although he would make better ones. Brown's trademark yowl is perhaps too much in evidence in the course of this picture, but audiences got the gag, and it was a sound-specific gag, important in 1930. Drawbacks, however, include Bennett's under-baked performance and those of the football players who prove that, in 1930 as now, the vast majority of footballers cannot act, despite whatever acumen they may have on the gridiron. For Wellman, this project may have just been something to get out of the way so that he could start work on "Public Enemy," but the film is at its best when he decides to linger on a detail; otherwise, it could have been a two-reeler.

A young woman, the college president's daughter (20 year old Joan Bennett) is convinced that to fix the school's penchant for losing football games, she should seduce the best players from around the country to come play for good old Upton College. While it sounds flirty and naughty, it's really quite tepid, and the film meanders listlessly through romance, dopey comedy, a few short musical numbers, and football footage. Seeing actual college football players playing themselves was of some interest, e.g. Bill Banker, nicknamed the "Blond Blizzard" because of his hair and his playing without a helmet(!), as was seeing Bennett soaking wet (ahem). The antics of Joe E. Brown are mostly a nuisance, though his cheer of Uppppppppppton is pretty cool. Overall, just not much here.

Early Wellman is always entertaining, constantly throwing in weird directorial touches. This one's a genre football comedy (Horse Feathers etc.) that has quite a few amusing aspects. Number one is the young, intelligent and sexy Joan Bennett, who is amazing in the scene where she is under the canoe with a football player, and then back on shore with her wet dress showing everything she's got, pre-code. Wow! And then there's Joe E. Brown, who in those days speed-read a a script and tossed it aside. Watch for the scene with the lovers before, across, under and behind the fountain; the hand-held (!) camera following the lovers through the trees; the amateur actors/football players in so many encounters with Bennett. The plot of this film deals with sexual recruitment of football players, which reflects uncomfortably on current issues on the Colorado campus. Not a good movie by any means, but it has great acting, great direction and a few good laughs. Made by young people with an astonishing quantity of talent, way back when it was still possible to make a stale story shine. 1930!