His Private Secretary

This light-hearted romantic comedy. Wayne had not yet developed into the man we would know as "Duke", but he definitely had presence. There are signs, though. Near the end of the movie, where "Dick" confronts his father about the woman he married, we see a hint of what is to become.

Richard (Dick) Wallace is a playboy whose father wants him to straighten up and join the family business, but Dick only wants to have a good time. He meets Marion and falls in love with her. He trades his car for a gas station in order to stay in the town she lives in to be near her, and convinces her to marry him. But, his father will not be convinced that Marion is not a gold digger. She sets out to prove to the old man that she is different, and does. Dick, however, has not yet changed, and suffers the consequences of his folly.

The movie is a bit choppy, and the plot is weak in places. Some of the supporting roles could have been stronger. Never-the-less, it is fun to watch John Wayne as the ne'er-do-well son of a rich man, and get his come-uppance at the hands of the preacher's granddaughter.

This is one of those movies that a person is going to have to make several allowances for in order to enjoy it. First, this movie was very short (60 minutes). Along with that, it seems to be filmed in segments and doesn't flow smoothly from one to the other. Quite choppy. Now, part of the reason for both of these aspects is probably to contain costs. And I fully understand that in lieu of the fact that this movie was produced during the Great Depression. However, these factors really stood out and gave the entire film a rather cheap feeling to it. Fortunately, there are a couple of good things going for this movie too. For one, it has John Wayne ("Richard Wallace") as the leading actor. Granted this is one of his earliest films and he doesn't quite have the screen presence he commanded in his later years. But that's only to be expected. Another good thing was the performance of Evalyn Knapp (as "Marion Hall"). She was really special. Be that as it may, these two ingredients couldn't quite overcome the weaknesses I mentioned earlier. As such, while the movie is definitely cute, I have to give it an average rating.

I first caught a glimpse of this film on a Sunday morning on a local independent station. The film was abruptly pre-empted for a college wrestling match or something. Until recently I was not able to revisit this film in it's entirety, but I remembered one thing that stood out, Evalyn Knapp. She is a mixture of silent actress Bessie Love and talkies Jean Harlow and Barbara Stanwyck. The obvious attraction to this film today is the presence of John Wayne in the male lead. Got to give him credit for doing something other than riding a horse and for trying his hands at something purporting to be drama. Others have complained that this movie was put on DVD and not restored to better condition. Got to understand one thing, this film has been in the public domain for so long it is lucky that it survives in any condition. It is a poverty row film, from something called Showmen's Pictures, sheesh never heard of em. The negative and first generation materials of this movie have probably long since gone out of existence and all that remains is the sub-par 16mm prints floating around in public domain. It was available on several low budget home video labels during the videotape years. Albeit the original print quality probably wasn't all that good to begin with but the picture is what it is. The plot of this movie has been reiterated by some of the other posters so it need not be repeated by me. So I'll get back to the thing that stood out for me before that college game interrupted my original viewing, Evalyn Knapp. She is perhaps the real star of this near 'dog' of a picture and she provides the grasping factor of 'cheesecake'. While she is presented as Wayne's love interest the producer's(and I agree) felt that she could add eye candy value to a hard to sell low budget by wearing slinky form fitting dresses. For being the female lead, we first see her in the film 30 minutes in and she is given nothing more to do than utter several lines and walk in and out of scenes with several tight fitting dresses. Arthur Hoyt(from the silent LOST WORLD)plays a secretary to Wayne's dad and ogles Knapp on several instances and who could blame him. So for many a depression era out of work guy in the audience he would be glad to enjoy a few minutes of Miss Knapp's figure before leaving the theatre back to the miserable reality of the Great Depression. So there's nothing more to be gotten out of this flick but Evalyn Knapp does really save the flick for this viewer and on a historical basis it provides a glimpse into John Wayne's early dramatic abilities.

Nice old movie tho it feels a bit short. My only complaint was not with the movie but the DVD I rented via Netflix. Westlake Enterainment's 2007 DVD shows little if any care was taken for improving the quality of movie during transfer to DVD. The transfer was horrible even considering the age of the film it should have been handled much better and cleaned up both visually and sonically. At times the faces seem almost like glaring white ghosts on screen. Scratches and obvious film damage abound as well.

John Wayne out of his boots and six gun was nice to see and he did well here playing the male romantic lead. Seems odd to see the Duke in a movie without gunfights and horse chases. If you want to see Wayne in a better romantic comedy tho I still suggest you watch "The Quiet Man" instead.

The plot for "His Private Secretary" is a good one. It's a variation on a common theme for later films about a rich father who rues that he has a son who has been spoiled. Only, the screenplay for this film is not very good. It has holes in places and isn't tightly put together. The quality overall is crude and rough.

The film was made by Mascot, one of the Tin Pan Alley studios of the time. It's an early John Wayne film – one of the first in which he is credited and has a lead. Even then, Evalyn Knapp is billed ahead of him. But like so many other players from Tin Pan Alley, she never went much further in film and was forgotten by the 1940s. Wayne is one of a small number of players who got a start in the bottom rung of movie makers but who climbed to the highest rung and stardom.

The acting is so-so here, but it does show that Wayne had some talent and early on was comfortable in front of the camera. He would go on to make many more films of various genres, including a host of dime Westerns before the 1939 John Ford film, "Stagecoach," that caused his star to rise.