Maybe It's Love

Along with the extraordinary output of William Wellman -- "Public Enemy, "Wings," "Wild Boys on the Road," "A Star is Born" and so forth -- there are a number of fairly ordinary entertainment films such as the studio would have wanted made. "Eleven Men and a Girl" -- which is the title I saw it under -- is one of them, a college football comedy played by Joan Bennett, Joe E. Brown and a squad of non-acting football players drawn from the ranks of the top teams of the two previous seasons. There are several visual touches that drive this above the purely ordinary, such as a graph of a football field, with positions indicated, each marked by a photo of the heroine (Bennett), whose gentle scheme is to get all of the fellas to believe that they have a sweetheart in her order to pump them up to greatness, as per George Ade's play "The College Widow," already filmed twice before. As the camera moves along the photos, cutaways are used to show the boys practicing hard, striving to make their game better. The film is dominated, however, by rubber-faced comedian Joe E. Brown, and this picture was important in establishing his popularity among film goers, although he would make better ones. Brown's trademark yowl is perhaps too much in evidence in the course of this picture, but audiences got the gag, and it was a sound-specific gag, important in 1930. Drawbacks, however, include Bennett's under-baked performance and those of the football players who prove that, in 1930 as now, the vast majority of footballers cannot act, despite whatever acumen they may have on the gridiron. For Wellman, this project may have just been something to get out of the way so that he could start work on "Public Enemy," but the film is at its best when he decides to linger on a detail; otherwise, it could have been a two-reeler.

Early Wellman is always entertaining, constantly throwing in weird directorial touches. This one's a genre football comedy (Horse Feathers etc.) that has quite a few amusing aspects. Number one is the young, intelligent and sexy Joan Bennett, who is amazing in the scene where she is under the canoe with a football player, and then back on shore with her wet dress showing everything she's got, pre-code. Wow! And then there's Joe E. Brown, who in those days speed-read a a script and tossed it aside. Watch for the scene with the lovers before, across, under and behind the fountain; the hand-held (!) camera following the lovers through the trees; the amateur actors/football players in so many encounters with Bennett. The plot of this film deals with sexual recruitment of football players, which reflects uncomfortably on current issues on the Colorado campus. Not a good movie by any means, but it has great acting, great direction and a few good laughs. Made by young people with an astonishing quantity of talent, way back when it was still possible to make a stale story shine. 1930!

Upton College President Sheffield's job is threatened after yet another football lost to rival Parsons College. His daughter Nan Sheffield (Joan Bennett) is desperate to help and her friend Yates (Joe E. Brown) comes up with an idea to recruit a whole new team. She has to take off her... glasses. She gets busy. Then there is the special case of Tommy Nelson (James Hall).

This is aka Eleven Men and a Girl. There are a couple of mildly humorous schemes to entice football players. These guys should have noticed that they are all after the same girl much sooner. Joan Bennett is a pretty pixie girl. This is a semi-musical. It has a few torch songs, but apparently the audience were getting a little tired of musicals during this time. It's not funny enough to be a comedy. The romance isn't that compelling. This movie seems to fall short on all sides.

Comedy star Joe E. Brown is given very little to do in a secondary role in this lame college football quickie. Twenty-year-old Joan Bennett stars as the university president's daughter who uses her charms to attract football talent to Upton in order to beat the school's rival and save her father's job. As a kind of gimmick, the cast includes several real-life collegiate football stars, but seen eighty-plus years later all that remains is amateur acting in a weak script (although admittedly I'm more of a baseball guy). Doughy leading man James Hall stands out like a sore thumb as the "star quarterback" among a roster of actual athletes.

To help her college's faltering football team, beautiful Joan Bennett (Nan) must seduce hunky football players into transferring to her school. It's the bright idea of gay friend Joe E. Brown (Yates). Will the young men discover each other? Will Ms. Bennett find true love among them? Will Upton win the "Big Game"?

"Maybe It's Love / Eleven Men and a Girl" is interesting in that it features Bennett and Brown on their way to becoming successful in the "talkies". They aren't there yet - Bennett is unspectacular and Brown's shrieks are more annoying than funny; later, he would successfully refine his comic persona. The best scene is early on, when Bennett and one of her football players topple their canoe, and emerge soaking wet.

*** Maybe It's Love (1930) William A. Wellman ~ Joan Bennett, Joe E. Brown, James Hall