True Confession

It's not often that Leonard Maltin puts down a vintage Hollywood 'classic' with top stars (calling it "alarmingly unfunny") – to find that same film, then, praised by an even more conservative critic as the late Leslie Halliwell seems even less likely (while conceding it has "longueurs and a lack of cinematic inventiveness", he considers it an "archetypal crazy comedy with many fine moments")…and, yet, that's just the case with this film! What's more, opinions about it continue to be mixed – as DVD Savant's unenthusing review ("truly a mess…really unsatisfying…this dog {of a comedy}" can attest!! So, I really didn't know what to expect here.

I actually enjoyed TRUE CONFESSION a lot and feel it's one of Carole Lombard's better vehicles – though not quite in the same league as her four top films, namely Howard Hawks' TWENTIETH CENTURY (1934), Gregory LaCava's MY MAN GODFREY (1936), William A. Wellman's NOTHING SACRED (1937) and Ernst Lubitsch's TO BE OR NOT OT BE (1942). The film has a wonderful premise: a female writer who's also a pathological liar admits to murder in order to promote the career of her struggling lawyer husband (who only takes a case if the accused is honest!).

As I said, Lombard is somewhere near her best here – especially disarming when adopting a literal tongue-in-cheek attitude as she's hatching a new 'plot'. Male lead Fred MacMurray – in his last of four teamings with her, three of which are included in Universal's Lombard Collection set – plays second fiddle to the star, but his courtroom plea commands attention (his naivete, then, is demonstrated when he and Lombard awkwardly re-enact the 'crime' for the benefit of judge and jury). Savant is especially harsh on John Barrymore (one of the great theatrical performers, he occasionally revealed himself a superb character comedian with an agreeable tendency to ham): I personally found his performance as an opportunist with a philosophical streak and an over-sized ego brilliant. He pesters Lombard's best friend, Una Merkel (herself a delightful comic actress and a reliable presence in many a 1930s film), in the courtroom by first blowing and then taking the air noisily out of balloons; eventually, he catches up with Lombard and MacMurray (the former being guilty of perjury for having confessed to a murder she didn't commit) and proposes a blackmail scheme – which, however, blows up in his face.

The supporting cast is equally well chosen: a typically nasty Porter Hall as the Prosecuting Attorney; Edgar Kennedy (the great Laurel & Hardy foil) is superb – and flustered as ever – in the role of the investigating cop; Tom Dugan, in one hilarious scene towards the beginning – the role is strikingly similar to that played by William Demarest in another Lombard/MacMurray vehicle I've just watched, HANDS ACROSS THE TABLE (1935); and Irving Bacon – again, his appearance is very brief but quite memorable as a befuddled coroner. The film was remade as CROSS MY HEART (1946), with Betty Hutton in Lombard's role – which I wouldn't mind watching if the opportunity ever arose, but don't really expect to be up to the original (even if Maltin actually thinks it's superior!).

Trivia: director Ruggles (incidentally, brother of comic Charles) had a curious connection with Carole Lombard; not only did he direct her and future husband Clark Gable in their only film together – NO MAN OF HER OWN (1932) – but SOMEWHERE I'LL FIND YOU (1942), also starring Gable…and which happened to be shooting at the time of Lombard's untimely and tragic death!!

Brilliant blend of screwball and black comedy with Carole Lombard at her best playing a compulsive liar married to a scrupulously honest lawyer, Fred MacMurray.

She gets duped into accepting a secretarial job that seems to good to be true. It is. She wrestles with the man, punches him in the stomach and leaves. Later that afternoon she goes back to retrieve her hat with pal Una Merkel. But just as they get up their courage to sneak in a get her things, the police show up because the man has been murdered.

In jail she concocts a scheme to say she killed him to defend her honor. MacMurray will defend her, free her, and become famous. All their troubles will be over. But in a bar sits a man, John Barrymore, who has ideas of cashing in on the murder case.

A flop in its day, but a terrific comedy with top performances by all. Lombard is totally wonderful as the liar who dreams up stories in the blink of an eye. MacMurray is solid, but Barrymore is great as the "world's preeminent criminologist." Supporting cast includes Lynne Overman, Porter Hall, Hattie McDaniel, Richard Carle, Fritz Feld, Edgar Kennedy, Tom Dugan, Irving Bacon, and Gary Owen.

Lombard and Barrymore are tops!

... and he's pathologically honest. In fact, Kenneth Bartlett is an attorney who will only take innocent clients. Someone should break it to him that the ethics of his profession - and the production code for that matter - only require that he not break the law himself and not suborn perjury. You're perfectly free to take guilty clients. They need counsel too.

As a result, the Bartletts don't have much money because Kenneth Bartlett can't get any innocent clients. His wife Helen (Carole Lombard) is a novelist, but she wants to get a job to help out with the lack of funds. Ken tells her not to, but she finds one anyways that only requires that she work three hours a day five days a week and pays 50 dollars a week. But when she shows up her employer, Otto Krayler, turns out to be a wolf and attacks her. She hits him with something and runs away. When she later tries to sneak back into the house to get her purse and hat, the police show up at the same time because Krayler has been murdered. She is arrested for the murder, and Ken ends up defending her. Somehow, after talking to Ken, she figures the only way she can get out of this is claim she did kill Krayler, but it was because he was assaulting her.

Helen is acquitted of the killing, and suddenly her fiction is in high demand and Ken starts getting more (innocent?) clients than he knows what to do with. They buy a large home on a lake. But then a monkey wrench gets thrown into all of this when an absurd criminologist (John Barrymore) shows up at the Bartlett home demanding a princely sum for Krayler's wallet - proof that he killed Bartlett. Complications ensue.

Yes, Lombard's character does some wacky things like going through with being a defendant in a murder trial when she had nothing to do with the killing, but Ken told her that to claim anything other than what she did could lead to the death penalty. So Ken gets annoyed at her when she wants a job because they don't have enough money to live due to his pickiness with clients, he tells her to plead not guilty would lead to her execution so she lies and pleads self defense, and then he gets annoyed at her later because she seems to be enjoying their prosperity even though it came at the expense of Krayler's life - she knows it did not.

I still rate this one pretty highly because the idea is a unique one and well executed, even if one major character is an unlikable drip.

I think a whole lot of people don't really get this film from the reviews I'm reading. Carol Lombard who likes to spin tall tales of exaggeration is married to poor, but honest lawyer Fred MacMurray and tries her best to help.

The key scene here in True Confessions is right at the beginning when Lombard fetches MacMurray a client who happens to be guilty. Someone should have told Fred that only Perry Mason can afford to represent innocent clients only. So when he declines to be a lawyer for a man who will pay him out of the stolen hams he swiped from a butcher shop, Carol decides that he needs a name acquittal to gain him clients.

When she goes for a job with lecherous millionaire John Murphy who later winds up dead and circumstantial evidence points to her, she 'confesses' kind of, sort of to exasperated police detective Edgar Kennedy. It's enough to get her arrested and her husband his first real client.

It's all kind of dumb, but Lombard's scheme is right out of the Lucy Ricardo playbook. The trial is one for the books as well with District Attorney Porter Hall letting victory slip through his fingers.

Another character pops in to almost upset the applecart. John Barrymore who was cast in the part at Lombard's request to repay the debt she owed him from Twentieth Century plays a 'criminologist' down on his luck who comes across some key evidence that could upset everyone's plans. Sadly though Barrymore does a great job in the part, he's really not acting at all. The role is a caricature of what Barrymore had become. But it was a payday and I'm sure he was grateful to Lombard somewhat.

Playing Ethel to Lombard's Lucy is Una Merkel, a role she'd done before and would again. Lombard's 'True Confession' scene with Kennedy is a priceless one.

I'm sure Fred MacMurray felt in this last of four films in which they were paired that Carole had a lot of 'Splaining to do'.

TRUE CONFESSION is one of the unsung gems of the 1930's, a brilliant black comedy that surprisingly is often written off as a misfire. I think it may be because it is so remarkably different than other 1930's comedies which usually feature lovable and endearing characters in a charming situation; in TRUE CONFESSION we get a certified pathological liar in Lombard and a downright menacing villain in Barrymore. Lombard starts as a woman finds herself falsely accused of murder, to help her husband's floundering career as a lawyer she falsely admits to the crime!! This wacky, envelope-pushing comedy is a thorough delight and makes the cynicism in a more famous Lombard picture, NOTHING SACRED, seem downright sugary. Alas, this picture, clearly inspired by the plot of the famous 1920's musical CHICAGO, was obviously too audacious in theme for 1930's audiences as it would be in 1942 when Ginger Rogers filmed the musical as a song-less comedy in ROXIE HART. CHICAGO was never really appreciated until it's 1975 revival and it's later film version with Renee Zellwegger, but critical respect for ROXIE HART came around with time and I believe it's time for TRUE CONFESSION too to get a new reevaluation as a pioneer black comedy.

Lombard is at her best as the novelist who couldn't tell the truth if she wanted to; Barrymore is superb in an over-the-top caricature of as seedy adventurer. Una Merkel is absolutely perfect as Carole's best friend, this has to be one of her greatest roles. Fred MacMurray is a solid presence as Lombard's devoted and idealistic husband and very sexy too, especially in those swimsuit scenes near the end. Famed movie musical chorine Toby Wing is fun in a bit part as the mistress/"secretary" of the deceased and Hattie McDaniel is hilarious in her few scenes and has perhaps the best line in the picture as she quizzes MacMurray about possibly representing her in as of yet uncommitted crime. Beautifully photographed by Ted Tetzlaff and brilliantly directed Wesley Ruggles, TRUE CONFESSION has more potential to become a cult film than any as of yet undiscovered 1930's comedy that I've seen.