I've Got Your Number

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.

If you know who Warren William, Marian Davies or Archie Mayo were, then there's two facts about you: 1. Your taste in movies is not the same as everyone else and 2. You will quite enjoy this film. If you have no idea who those people are then you're either not over 130 years old or don't spend your time watching pre-code Warner Brothers b-movies......and will probably find this film a bit of a nothing.

Even for those of us who watch these types of movies, this is nothing special but it's got that familiar type of 'nothing special' which some of us have just got used to. Like smoking, you just get into the habit of watching nonsense like this. You watch the same people turn up and do the same stuff in all these types of film, they're almost like your extended dysfunctional family - you feel connected. I've Gone Your Number is not one of the best but it's still an hour and a bit of fun, silliness, suspense, sexism and wisecracks.

Why is it not one of the best?

You will wonder why Pat O'Brien isn't James Cagney because surely he'd do it better. Pat O'Brien could swagger it as well as Cagney but he's very much a second best choice. Although his character is meant to be a lad-about-town, even for 1934, he comes across as quite an unpleasant bully. These days, his 'courtship' of Joan Blondell wouldn't result in a romantic kiss but several months in jail.

Joan Blondell doesn't stretch her acting skills too much in this, indeed she's very much just the passenger. She's always trying to do the right thing but gets taken advantage of - we would rather see her in control, not just a helpless damsel in distress.

Even though she was not well when filming this, she is still the usual sparky, wisecracking, gorgeous and compassionate dame you expect. Whatever she's in, she guarantees to make you smile. Us twelve year old boys who were born in 1920 should be grateful that the censors failed to remove one little scene at the end, that's of Joan leaning over the bed in a very low cut negligee - golly! This scene was actually filmed at Joan's own home - she was recovering from an operation so too Ill to go to the studio. Even having a major operation was no excuse for slacking if you worked for Warner Brothers!

.. 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.

I've Got Your Number casts Pat O'Brien and Joan Blondell as a pair who make their living with the phone company. O'Brien is a line repairmen and Blondell is a switchboard operator. O'Brien is a roughneck, but as Blondell learns he grows on you after a while.

O'Brien gets Blondell a job with Henry O'Neill's brokerage house, but she's suspected of being part of a gang that robs the place of six figures of negotiable securities. It's up to O'Brien and sidekick Allen Jenkins to clear her.

I've Got Your Number is fast and breezy and entertaining. The film has a good pace to it and doesn't let up, My favorite scenes are with Glenda Farrell and a phony spiritualism racket she's got going. Farrell steals the film in her scenes.

You'll also like Eugene Pallette in his scenes as O'Brien's overwrought boss.

One good product from Warner Brothers.