Brides Are Like That

Charming, college-educated Ross Alexander (as Bill McAllister) has everything going for him except a job. His wealthy uncle Joseph Cawthorn (as Fred Schultz) likes his only heir, but is tired of paying Mr. Alexander's bills. When Alexander charges an expensive engagement ring to his account, tongue-tied Uncle Cawthorn cuts him off. The ring is for pretty blonde Anita Louise (as Hazel Robinson), but she has an offer from another suitor; responsible Richard "Dick" Purcell (as Randolph "Doc" Jenkins) is also preferred by Ms. Louise's parents, Gene and Kathleen Lockhart (as John "Jackie Boy" and Ella Robinson)...

Alexander decides to use flattery to his advantage...

What makes this fine adaptation of Barry Conners' Broadway success "Applesauce" (1925) work so well is the use of flattery for something not as sinister as the clever trickster in Aesop's fables; with an especially engaging performance, a smooth-talking Alexander keeps you on his side. The empathetic moment when Alexander seems to accept his loss, and pauses outside her home, is a highlight. Louise is irresistible, with her eavesdropping and next scene with Alexander very well-played. Support from others is excellent, and you get a chance to see future favorite June Lockhart's parents acting together (as Mr. and Mrs. John Robinson).

******** Brides Are Like That (3/22/36) William McGann ~ Ross Alexander, Anita Louise, Joseph Cawthorn, Gene Lockhart

Badly dated romantic comedy, based on play, about a shiftless, fast-talking young man who can;t seem to hold a job. Nor does he really want to. He lives off a well-do-do uncle. Ross Alexander, a sort of precursor to Bob Hope, plays the golf-loving lad. Most of the movie is taken up with a love triangle: Alexander, Anita Louise as the fetching daughter of a banker played by Gene Lockhart and a young doctor played by Dick Purcell. The movie is very stage-bound, and nothing much really happens. The best that can be said of it is that Alexander delivers his lines like a machine gunner on speed, and Lockhart and the fellow playing Alexander's uncle make good foils. Louise is amazingly pretty under all that '30s makeup and hairdo. The ending is abrupt and unsatisfying. I hate to think the play ended the same way.

Here's a nifty little vintage "rom-com" from Warner Brothers' B-unit. Starring the affable wiseacre Ross Alexander and lovely Anita Louise, Brides Are Like That provides a few chuckles and a more than pleasant experience.

Like so many 1930's romances, it's based on a play, and this one is from about a dozen years earlier entitled, "Applesauce," which refers to an extended metaphor used throughout. The fairly standard plot involves a love triangle between the two leads and stodgy Dick Purcell, who plays an M.D. with designs on Louise. Alexander portrays a charming loafer who'd rather golf than work, and the girl must choose between the two, with the Lockharts as her parents pushing her into marriage with Purcell.

In typical Warner Brothers style, the exceedingly clever dialog moves at a crisp, almost rapid-fire, pace which enlivens what could easily have become a set-bound and ponderous experience for the audience. The characters are all certainly quirky -- almost foreshadowing the later You Can't Take It With You.

I find Ross Alexander to be a very like-able screen presence always, and here he really demonstrates a lot of potential as a comic leading man, in the way of contemporaries like George Burns or Bob Hope. He's looks great, without being too conventionally handsome, and really seems like a guy that both men and women would respond to. And Anita Louise obviously is stunningly beautiful, without any bad angle at which to be photographed.

All told, Brides Are Like That does its source material proud, and provides slightly over an hour's worth of frivolity and amusement.

Hazel (Anita Louise) has two men who want to marry her. Randolph is a doctor...and very reliable...but also about as much fun and interesting as a ball of lint. In contrast, Bill is fun and unpredictable...but also incredibly lazy and undisciplined. For some odd reason, Hazel thinks she has to choose between them...and she chooses Bill. As for Bill, he's about as mature as an 8 year-old...and is constantly talking. I personally wanted to punch Bill in the beezer!

So is this film any good? Not really. Bill is simply annoying and you cannot understand why Hazel would want him. And, by the end of the film, you're left thinking this as well! Overall, a weird and unsatisfying film....one that seemed incomplete and one in which Bill learned absolutely nothing...except how to use people and annoy them.

The title of Brides Are Like That is a misleading one since the plot of the film turns on the behavior of the potential groom Ross Alexander. Potential bride Anita Louise is expecting certain behaviors out of Ross that he seems incapable of fulfilling.

Louise's parents are Gene and Kathleen Lockhart and Gene is acting in the typical Eugene Palette way with concern about his daughter getting hooked up with a bum. It bothers Joseph Cawthorn who is Alexander's uncle and only relative that the young man won't just go out and work and give up his Bohemian ways. Remember this is the Great Depression and attitudes like that are understandable.

In these Thirties comedies there is always a Ralph Bellamy part and in this case it's played by Dick Purcell. Someone halfway decent definitely could have taken Louise away from Alexander, but Purcell is such a sanctimonious drip that no wonder she prefers Alexander to him.

The main fault with Brides Are Like That is Alexander's character is just a little too Bohemian. And I can't believe there wasn't another alternative out there than Purcell.

Still the film has its amusing moments, mostly provided by Dick Purcell.