So This Is London

Will Rogers plays an American mill owner who has to go to England for business ... but he hates the English. So he rounds up his wife (Irene Rich) and his just graduated son (Frank Albertson) and makes the voyage cross the Atlantic. Onboard, Albertson meets a pretty English girl (Maureen O'Sullivan in her first American film) and the two fall in love ... while Rogers and Rich spend the trip with sea sickness.

Of course O'Sullivan's parents are terrible snoots and hate Americans (Lumsden Hare, Mary Forbes) so when Lady Amy (Dorothy Christy invites them all for the weekend, you know it's not going to be good. While the snoots sit when dinner is announced, Rich comes galloping down stairs and yells, "Pa, the chow's on" at which point Rogers comes sliding down the banister letting out Indian war whoops. Once down, he and the missus do a war dance number. You get the idea.

In the end the parents come to see eye to eye once all the charades are over but Rogers gets quite a few zingers in and tells some funny stories. It ends with the drunken Rogers and Hare bellowing "God Save the Queen" / "My Country 'Tis of Thee."

The most famous quote attributed to Will Rogers is "I haven't met a man I didn't like"...yet in "So This Is London" he plays a man who hates the English...and for no particularly good reason. So when Hiram (Rogers) is forced to go to Britain on business, his family accompanies him to keep him out of trouble. However, as the story progresses, the young man falls for an English girl whose father hates Americans every bit as much as Hiram hates the English! Naturally, fireworks result!

I can assume that Rogers deliberately played against type in order to show how silly bigotry is. I also laughed when he yelled at the obnoxious little girl on the ship...and she said she came from Claremore, Oklahoma...the same town Rogers actually lived in at the time! I also think he played a stupid stereotype of an American Indian (to scare the family of the Engish girl his son is smitten with) because in reality Rogers WAS a Native American...again, I think he's parodying these stereotypes.

So is this any good? Yes...and the film sure fits Rogers' world view. I found the movie charming and fun. My only complaint is that Rogers' style of speaking was a bit mumbly and his asides were often forgettable...something he corrected in later films. I also think editing these remarks a bit would have helped to make a more polished film.

His partners want Will Rogers to go to England to negotiate for some English mills. Rogers doesn't like the English, but wife Irene Rich and son Frank Albertson talk him into making it a family holiday. While the parents are brought low by seasickness on the ship over, Albertson meets and falls in love with Maureen O'Sullivan (in her first Hollywood movie). When they get there, Miss O'Sullivan's father, Lumsden Hare, is just as prejudiced about Americans as Rogers is about the English, leading to a general breakdown.

It's odd seeing Rogers so grouchy, but it's a pleasure to see him performing with Miss Rich. They seem so well suited, both in temper, humor, and comfort that it's easy to believe them a married couple. Some of the comedy here is a bit off-putting, but in the end Rogers' self-deprecating charm shines through.

It's worth noting that Rogers' slow, awkward pacing suits the slow pacing of the editing, as the camera lingers on him as he thinks out his witty remarks. It's not the most polished of his talkies, and the poor copy I looked at did it few favors, but as usual, with Rogers to listen to, it's charming. With Bramwell Fletcher, Mary Forbes, and Dorothy Christy.