Rayon d'amour

"Happiness Ahead" is a title that might lure a citizen into a movie theater during the depression. Dick Powell and Josephine Hutchinson are the couple paired to provide the happiness in this story about an heiress (natch!) who falls for a working stiff.

The story is very basic. Fortunately, Powell (as Bob Lane) has a nifty singing voice, so the script can allow him to vocalize at regular intervals. The happy couple base their relationship on the misunderstanding that Hutchinson (as Joan Bradford)is also a member of the working class--a misunderstanding that she promotes, and that drives the tension of this story, though things are not that tense. Lightheartedness is the order of the day.

Frank McHugh plays Bob's sidekick, whose antics are like a tame version of Curly Howard's--typical for his work. John Halliday plays the aristocratic father of Joan with a light touch that is appealing.

You can guess what happens to the two lovebirds in the end. The film is a pleasant diversion.

I would not go so far as to call this a musical, although some might because Dick Powell does do some singing in it. To my way of thinking a musical is simply where the music dominates the telling of a story. That is not so in this case. It is a romantic comedy with a song or two in it. It has the old fashioned boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy marries girl theme in it. The concept of s-e-x is 1934 style, with the two parties barely able to kiss one another until deep in the relationship. If you don't need special effects to tell a story, then you will like this one. The actors all speak like stage trained personnel with emphatic speech typical of the period. Many fine character actors in the cast including Frank McHugh and Allan Jenkins. It is just a classical and entertaining film comedy the way America used to do it. I loved it.

Not only did Dick Powell get a hit film from Warner Brothers with Happiness Ahead, but he got a radio theme song as long as he was concentrating on musicals.

Breaking tradition somewhat, the film opens with Powell singing the title song Happiness Ahead. For the next several years until Powell was doing the dramatic parts he wanted, the song Happiness Ahead served as his theme song in the same way that Where The Blue Of The Night was Bing Crosby's theme. But the film didn't end here.

Happiness Ahead is a typical Depression Era film with either a poor shop girl falling for some young millionaire playboy or in this case the other way around. Josephine Hutchinson plays the young débutante who is bored to tears with her society peers and goes out with maid Ruth Donnelly and chauffeur Allen Jenkins one night. At a night club she meets Dick Powell who charms her with a couple of other songs Beauty Must Be Loved and Pop Goes Your Heart.

He's a dispatcher for a window washing company and looking to form a company of his own with pal Frank McHugh. Powell doesn't know about Josephine's big bucks and she wants to keep it that way for the moment, but maybe help him on the sly.

Of course this leads to all kinds of complications, business and romantic, but in true Hollywood style it all gets resolved in the end.

One role I found especially interesting is that of Russell Hicks who plays a grafting politician who has the necessary contacts to get Powell the jobs he needs. We pay him off first before anything else happens. It was an extremely true and insightful role coming from a film that the workingman's studio of Warner Brothers made.

John Halliday also has a good part as Hutchinson's father. He made it the hard way himself and secretly appreciates what Josephine wants in a man.

So if you like Dick Powell the singer as well as Dick Powell the hardboiled noir star, Happiness Ahead will make you very happy indeed.

During the 1930s, Dick Powell played a lot of similar roles--the fresh-faced young man who sings some very high-pitched but pleasant songs. The public adored it...and Powell hated it and wanted meatier, tougher roles. In my opinion, he was right and his tough- guy roles are my favorites. As for the guy he plays in "Happiness Ahead", it's pretty much the typical 30s Powell film.

Joan (Josephine Hutchinson) is a rich, pampered society girl. However, she's vaguely dissatisfied about this and longs for fun in her life...something sorely lacking at her boring high-brow parties. So, she decides to slum it and goes on on New Years Eve to see how the normal folks live and celebrate. There she meets nice-guy, Bob (Powell) and they soon start dating. She's very happy but he has no idea she's loaded.

This plot is awfully familiar in the 1930s. You would have thought that films would have avoided the whole bored rich girl angle--after all, it WAS the Depression and many folks were just happy to get enough to eat! But despite this, films like "Five and Ten" and "Poor Little Rich Girl" and this one were pretty common. This isn't necessarily a complaint but does mean that the film isn't exactly original.

So is it any good? Well, most of the songs were pretty forgettable but I liked the one Powell and Frank McHugh sang as they washed windows as well as the weird number in the bizarre Chinese restaurant/night club near the beginning of the picture. I personally just hoped they'd end soon so they could get back to the romance--which was rather cute and enjoyable. Deep? No way...but cute.

"Happiness Ahead" is a romance with some comedy and music that is set, as most such films were during the Great Depression, in New York City. This is another working stiff meets wealthy person, the latter who is anonymous. This one has a different twist that makes it a little more fun.

Dick Powell stars as the working man and Josephine Hutchinson is the millionairess in Cognito. This was her first film since one appearance as a child in a 1917 silent film. Hutchinson would go on to have a long career in films and then television to the mid-1970s. But it would be in supporting roles, not as a leading lady for which the First National and Warner Brothers tried to present her in the buildup for this film.

Some other familiar faces of supporting actors people this film - all of which gives it some familiarity and enjoyment. The musical aspect consists of one dance performance in a Chinese nightclub and Dick Powell singing a couple of numbers.