God's Gift to Women

I thought this film was much better than its IMDb rating (4.9/10 at the time). It's an obscure early talkie, but it's mildly amusing and, at only 72 minutes, no great waste of time.

For movie buffs, the draw of this film is its cast and crew. It's one of Joan Blondell's early films and it's a rare opportunity to see iconic silent screen star Louise Brooks in a talkie. It's also one of the few films of popular vaudeville comedian Frank Fay. Familiar character actors like Alan Mowbray and Charles Winninger have supporting roles, and the whole thing is directed by the great Michael Curtiz (CASABLANCA).

GOD'S GIFT TO WOMEN (1931) is a comedy about romance. Frank Fay plays a modern-day Don Juan, a notorious Parisian playboy and ladies' man who is smitten with an American tourist. His high-living social crowd and various paramours complicate his efforts to win over the girl (and her father) and become a one-woman man. His situation gets tougher when he is diagnosed with an aneurysm that threatens his life if he is overly excited (i.e., "no more girls"). Would he go for that last kiss if he knew it would mean instant death?

Frank Fay gives a solid comedic performance, with his sort of off-the-cuff wit. He nimbly toes the line of pre-Code profanity, several times saying "Go to --" before abruptly switching gears. He's particularly funny once he learns he's a dying man. There's a fun scene where he quibbles with an undertaker about his funeral arrangements.

Laura La Plante is a nice-looking girl, but she just doesn't have "it" and she makes for a rather dull leading lady. Luckily she disappears for much of the second half of the film, allowing Curtiz to showcase Joan Blondell, Louise Brooks, and Yola d'Avril buzzing around Fay's bedroom in various states of dress (as they all come to nurse Fay back to health).

Joan Blondell is a favorite of mine and she sparkles in her secondary role, jumping on top of Frank Fay (who must avoid women, lest his aorta burst) when she finds him an uncooperative patient. Louise Brooks's name is almost lost in the middle of the cast list and she doesn't have a very big part, but she makes an impression in that bedroom farce scene with her alluring attire and screen presence.

"God's Gift to Women" is nowhere near a star turn for Louise Brooks. The movie belongs to Frank Fay, who was a popular Broadway star of light comedies at the time, and the first husband of Barbara Stanwyck. Casting the effeminate Fay as a Casanova was a stretch, but his delivery is quite funny in places. The plot line is pretty predictable stuff, but there's a sweet little twist in the final scenes.

Laura La Plante, a tall, rangy Missouri beauty, has the female lead. She successfully made the transfer from silents to talkies. La Plante is charming, and she is photographed to best advantage.

Tenth billing. This is what Hollywood did with Louise Brooks in the early 30s, even after she had made "Pandora's Box" and "Diary of a Lost Girl," the two German films which assured her immortality. But very few Americans had seen those movies at all in 1931, and those who had saw only heavily censored versions.

Very little has changed in Hollywood in the past nearly 80 years. Consider Adrien Brody, whose Oscar netted him Diet Coke commercials, and Halle Berry, whose Golden Boy landed her roles in screen gems such as "Gothika" and "Catwoman." Hollywood punished Louise Brooks for being an independent thinker. Yet she makes the most of her 4-5 minutes' screen time in "God's Gift to Women." As always, you simply can't take your eyes off her.

In this painfully drawn out bedroom farce, set in Paris, Frank Fay is miscast as the titular love object, a descendant of Don Juan, who is smitten with a young American in Paris (Laura LaPlante) but in order to win her must extricate himself from the tangled web of his long- term intrigues with a virtual harem of lovers (played by Joan Blondell, Margaret Livingston, a sadly underused Louise Brooks and others).

The set up is amusing and deftly staged by Michael Curtiz, but once the direction of the plot becomes clear it bogs down in long, boring and insultingly stupid gag sequences, one upon another, involving Fay's diagnosis with a potentially fatal illness; eventually the viewer can only long for this character's demise.

The fine lineup of female supporting players is wasted as are Charles Winninger as LaPlante's suspicious and protective father and Alan Mowbray as (what else?) the butler. Tyrrell Davis gets to wrap the whole thing up with a decadent chuckle, foreshadowing his even more unusual closing moment in "Our Betters" two years later.

Frank Fay's trademark casual banter works against him here because it only adds to the already sluggish pace.

During the 1920s, Frank Fay was the highest paid performer in vaudeville, the comedian from whom Jack Benny candidly admitted he lifted his on-stage style. By 1931 when "God's Gift to Women" was released, he had married Barbara Stanwyck and groomed her for stardom while his own career was rapidly declining. An arrogant drunk with a flair for alienating his fellow performers, Fay's downfall didn't get much sympathy though it purportedly inspired the movie, "A Star is Born." For more than a decade, he was the classic example of a "used-to-was" until the producers of the Broadway play, "Harvey," tapped him to play Elwood P. Dowd. It was among the most memorable stage performances I've ever seen, a classic of fey (sic) whimsy and superb comedy timing. Jimmy Stewart in the screen version, couldn't come close. Suddenly, a far less arrogant Frank Fay was enjoying the accolades that had eluded him since the late 1920s. Watch "God's Gift to Women," a stiff, stilted early pre-code romantic romp and you'll see both why Fay's career went downhill and conversely why he had the ideal vaguely befuddled style to play a man with a six foot tall rabbit as a pal.

Plot? Who cares about the plot? Something about a guy with several attractive girlfriends, including the incendiary Louise Brooks and the magnetic Joan Blondell. We should all have this problem. ;>

The main action involves the classic situation of juggling three women in different bedrooms. We've all seen this a million times and always wished the juggling act would fail, the women would encounter each other, and a catfight would ensue. Guess what? This time it happens! It may not be a classic catfight, but the brawl between Louise, Joan and another attractive brunette is worth the price of admission.

This movie will appeal mainly to fans of Louise Brooks. Her part is relatively small and she appears sans her famous Dutch-bob hair helmet, thus revealing a rather high forehead. You will still be in love with her, guaranteed. The real irony here is that several other actresses appear with the hairstyle she made not only famous, but possibly immortal. The Louise Legion will also be interested in her voice acting. Her voice is fine, but the role gives her no real opportunity to display her ability. As we all know, things never really got better on that front, either.

So don't expect much out of this, just kick back and enjoy one of the great beauties of film history, the incredible Louise Brooks.