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Having never heard of this movie before, I found it to be a pleasant surprise when I found it on youtube. From reading the other reviews, it appears I'm in the minority, but I can't help it. In most cases, a film either has me after a few minutes, or it doesn't. From the start, I found Gene Tierney to be enchanting and, as the plot unfolded, I thought, "Ooh, this going to be fun.", and it was. People have compared this to "The Lady Eve", but that has a plot even more preposterous. I mean, come one, only someone with brain damage wouldn't know Eve and Jean are the same person. So, John thinking he had discovered a method for gambling doesn't seem that far-fetched. Though not one of the best film comedies of all time, it was still enjoyable.

According to the Citadel Film series book The Films Of Henry Fonda, Rings On Her Fingers was the third of a three picture deal that Rouben Mamoulian had with 20th Century Fox. The other two films done in this package were the Tyrone Power classics, The Mark Of Zorro and Blood And Sand. Would that this film were light years as good as those two were.

Not that it's bad, but it's strictly second rate Mamoulian and definitely second rate Fonda. This was the period in Fonda's career where he had signed a studio contract to get the role in The Grapes Of Wrath and Darryl Zanuck would be forcing him into things that were second rate. This part that Fonda has here was a ripoff of what he did on loan to Paramount for The Lady Eve.

Fonda is once again the naive pigeon of some con artists played by Spring Byington and Laird Cregar. They're using Gene Tierney who is lured by the chance of easy money into their nest as the come on in a confidence game. The three rook Fonda out of his life savings, selling him a sailboat they don't own. They think Fonda has millions to spare, but unlike in The Lady Eve, Fonda is a clerk on holiday.

But he doesn't know Tierney was part of the gag and the two fall for each other. That however interferes with Cregar and Byington's plans to marry Tierney off to a real millionaire, Sheppard Strudwick.

Rings On Her Fingers is not a bad film, but Fonda who was doing mostly classic roles in The Male Animal and The Lady Eve on loan, back at his home studio was given parts that Zanuck's favorites Tyrone Power and Don Ameche passed on. Fonda hated those years at Fox, hated them more because he wanted to go in the service and Zanuck pulled all kinds of strings to keep him home.

Fonda played naive characters since his debut in The Farmer Takes A Wife and throughout his career before his war service tried desperately to avoid the typecasting. After Mister Roberts no one thought to cast him that way again, but in his early years it was a struggle to avoid it.

Best scenes in Rings On Her Fingers involve Fonda and Tierney at a gambling casino run by Henry Stephenson where things are fixed for him to win. Of course Fonda thinks he's found a mathematical formula and his recklessness increases.

Laird Cregar is good in a most undefined role as a con man. What a loss he was at such a young age.

Rings On Her Fingers belongs in the lower tier of Henry Fonda films though it does have its moments.

In 1941, a year after Fonda made "Grapes of Wrath" for Twentieth Century Fox', the studio loaned him out to Paramount Pictures for Preston Sturges' hugely successful "Lady Eve." That film gave Fonda a rare chance to play comedy, and he is particularly believable and appealing as the naive millionaire. Fox's head of production, Daryl Zanuck, saw the tremendous box-office potential in casting his dramatic star in similar roles, and a year later produced this pleasant ripoff of Sturges' premise: what would happen if a con-artist (in "Eve" Stanwyck, in this film Gene Tierney) fell for the man she'd conned. Tierney is as always very lovely and considerably less wooden than normal in the part of the reformed crook, but it is Fonda with his All-American Boy good looks who steals the show. Rouben Mamoulian, usually not associated with this sort of fluff, does an excellent job of directing.

Gene Tierney wants "Rings on Her Fingers" in this 1942 comedy starring Henry Fonda, Laird Cregar and Spring Byington. Tierney is a shopgirl drafted by Byington and Warren to help them con rich men out of their money. One of their marks is Fonda, with whom Tierney falls in love. Problems arise, and that's putting it mildly.

Mamoulian loved scripts that contained characters with dual identities such as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and The Mark of Zorro, so "Rings on Her Fingers" must have appealed to him. It has Tierney, a New York salesgirl posing as an heiress, Fonda, an accountant who at first gives the impression he's a rich man, Cregar, posing as a yacht owner, and Byington, posing as Tierney's wealthy mother.

I liked this charming comedy, but I have to take issue with calling it screwball. It's played too straight. Fonda creates a wonderful character - a sincere, caring person who wants to live life in the present and not live as others - lock up their money and, in so doing, lock up their lives. His internalized approach to acting did not lend itself to comedy. Tierney is gorgeous, and a good actress, but comedy wasn't her thing. Picture the airport scenes with Irene Dunne and Cary Grant, and you get the point.

Laird Cregar is wonderfully bombastic and funny as the conniver Warren - what a loss to filmdom that he died so young; and Spring Byington does a great job as his partner.

Henry Fonda never forgave Darryl F. Zanuck for forcing him into a seven-year contract in order to do The Grapes of Wrath; though Mamoulian was a great director, I think Fonda probably felt misused here. Opposite a pro like Stanwyck, he fared in comedy much better. Tierney is lovely, though.

Good film.

Somewhere between a romantic comedy and a screwball comedy, Rings on Her Fingers has its funny moments, but it also manages to occasionally fall into a boring moralism. Gene Tierney is magnificent, but she deserved a bolder role, other than that of a teenager in love.

Henry Fonda also seems ill-suited for comedy. It has never been his specialty, and the few times he succeeded, it was mainly due to the talent of his occasional partner (see The Lady Eve with Barbara Stanwick). Here, neither Tierney nor Fonda can pull each other off. Laird Cregar and Spring Byington are much more entertaining in the supporting roles.

A story that had everything to be an excellent screwball comedy but, unfortunately, is nothing more than a not very inspired romantic comedy, despite the quality of the cast.