Bachelor Apartment

Back before the newer, tougher Production Code was enacted in July, 1934, films were often quite bawdy--far bawdier than most folks today would expect. While nudity was rare (but NOT unheard of), topics like homosexuality, promiscuity, infidelity and even abortion were talked about in Hollywood films. While not among the more risqué films of the day, "Bachelor Apartment" is very Pre-Code in its sensibilities!

Wayne Carter (Lowell Sherman--who also directed this film) is an unabashed womanizer and playboy. He uses a wide variety of pickup lines and routines to get women to sleep with him and in this Pre- Code world, the women are more than eager to oblige. However, when he meets a nice lady, Helene (Irene Dunne), he has second thoughts about his life. While he loves the hot sex, he starts to realize that he's missing out on something. So, to be near Helene, he hires her to be his secretary and through most of the film admires her without telling her he loves her. Does this dirty old man have a prayer with Helene? And, is he capable of changing to get her?

I liked this film. Sherman was a terrific actor and if he hadn't died so young, he'd probably be remembered today--both for his stage and screen work. It talks about the old double-standard and exposes both the positive side (it can be fun) and negative (ultimately, it's rather lonely) without being preachy or heavy-handed. Well worth seeing.

Another of the movies I would not think of watching but for Irene Dunne, playing anything but swank comedy here. It consists of basically two types of characters. One is ladies in lingerie or revealing gowns. (Dunne wears neither but at one point we see her in her boss's bathrobe.) The other is gentlemen who appear to prefer other gentlemen.

One of these is its director and star, Lowell Sherman. He had a solid hand as a director and is likable as a performer. But he's a little hard to buy as a ladies' man. And in one scene, he goes to a friend's apartment, demanding to see who's in the bedroom. Instead of the woman he's looking for, two men are there. They're fully clothed and maybe the audience at the time thought they were sleeping off hangovers. Maybe that's what the script meant, for all I know. But it's not the way they come across in the context of the movie.

The print I saw was fuzzy but it's chic and entertaining -- dated but also risqué.

John Howard Lawson, later one of the blacklisted Hollywood Ten, composed this screenplay which is ostensibly quite the reverse from his normal proletarian bent, but is actually deeply altered by wordsmith J. Walter Ruben to a suave and somewhat risqué (pre-Code) comedy. Fortunately, some sense of Lawson's customary concerns remains, and is dealt with nicely by Irene Dunne, co-starring with the elegant Lowell Sherman, who also directs with his usual flare in this tale of a Park Avenue man about town struggling with a raft of nubile and aggressive young creatures. An early sound film, it forms the first arrangement of what has become a basic cinema plot device, as we know it, that of the carefree unmarried man being chastened from his rollicking ways by exposure to feelings of romantic love. Cinematography by the brilliant Lee Tover is of particular value here and one should advert to the art direction of Max Ree, who garnered an Academy Award for his characteristic talent during this same year (1931) as a result of his work with CIMARRON. Although Mae Murray's flamboyance is transcendental, the acting is generally quite good, with a particularly strong and stage-accented performance from the lovely Dunne as an older sister attempting to shepherd a wayward sibling while standing her own ground against a playboy's blandishments. One of the final pieces of Sherman's tragically shortened directorial career, the film offers many admirable passages, none less so than the opening scene, with that eternal butler Charles Coleman patiently dealing with an importunate telephone and doorbell, setting the pace in a picture that never pushes too hard or tries too strenuously for its effects.

I watched this on TCM for one reason: curiosity about Mae Murray. I had never seen her in a talkie, heard she was exceptionally bad and was expecting her to have a high-pitched or grating voice with a common accent. What a surprise to hear something more like a cross between Billie Burke and Myrna Loy but deeper. She still had "it" in the Thirties, with a fine figure, and I am not alone in wondering why she fizzled out so quickly. Over the top? Yes. Even obnoxious (particularly when she bursts into kooky peals of laughter) - but entertaining. When she's on screen you don't look at anyone else.

The second surprise was the direction by Lowell Sherman and the story by John Howard Lawson. There is a naturalness to the dialogue and a lifelike quality to the characters' frequent and casual banter that brings you inside the world of young ladies struggling in New York City during the early Depression years. Some exteriors are actual location shots of New York City streets and the interiors are depicted in detail, particularly clutter on tables (the aftermath of a wild party in the titular penthouse and breakfast paraphernalia in the humble flat inhabited by Dunne and her sister). Surely the leftwing Lawson was responsible for the haves-vs-have-nots element of the story. It's a witty and somewhat farcical tale about a Park Avenue business executive consumed with the pursuit and avoidance of an army of attractive young women until he meets Miss Right (Irene Dunne - no one ever righter). The supporting cast is mostly excellent, particularly Noel Francis as one of Sherman's pickups. She registered very strongly in a very brief scene as the prostitute in I AM A FUGITIVE FROM A CHAIN GANG.

At first sight one cannot accept the puffy and dissipated Sherman as a desirable ladies' man. Only in his mid-40s when he directed and starred in this film, he looks 10 years older and occasionally slurs his speech but nevertheless manages to be charming and totally in control in the kind of role Robert Montgomery was born to play. I see from IMDb that Sherman was a director of some note and consider it a sad loss for cinema that he died so young, though seeing him here and in WHAT PRICE Hollywood it's obvious he was far from robust. I intend to look for other films he directed based on my happy experience with BACHELOR APARTMENT.

I didn't expect much from this film when I first saw it, not knowing who Lowell Sherman was and figuring it would be extremely dated.

I found out the film provided some good laughs, some clever sarcastic dialog, realistic characters and a certain charm at the same time.

Sherman might have been a bit too old to be playing the role of playboy but he carried it off, being enjoyable to watch. It was fun seeing such a young Irene Dunne, too, complete with the early '30s short hairstyle. Unlike most of the women pictured in this film, Dunne played her typical high-principled character, reflecting the classy lady she was off screen, too.