La demoiselle du téléphone

Watching Cary Grant in any movies usually means you can expect it to be enjoyable. This movie although short is fine as a funny type of movie from that era. The director of this movie is obviously following the Lubitcsh formula for comedy although not as good as Lubitcsh. You have to give the director credit however in making this short movie interesting. There was obviously budget constraints, but looking at the core supporting players, they actually do an excellent job. George Barbier plays a familiar role of a father who demands his wife is to be married. This is also the role he played however as king in "The Smiling Lieutenant" and he has that role down. What's amazing is the performance of Nydia Westman as Susie Flamberg. She plays and has dialog which is much like Claudette Colbert's role as the daughter seeking the love interest.

In the case of The Smiling Lieutenant, Maurice Chevalier is the love interest the daughter seeks, but in this case it's Cary Grant. When watching an old copy of this movie I actually thought for a moment based on the dialog that Nydia Westman was Caudette Colbert and had to do a double take at the credits.

These are probably formula roles for comedy by this time in the 30s, kind of a formula for haphazard comedy. Never the less, it's fun to watch and not bad. Wish I had a better sounding audio on the copy I saw. I wonder if there are even any good masters of this film available that could meet Turner's quality requirements for release. I give it a solid 7 perhaps it would rate a little better if there had been better audio.

Ladies Should Listen (1934)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Julian De Lussac (Cary Grant) is a businessman who is going broke so he falls in love with a woman (Nydia Westman) to try and get her money. Soon she begins to lose interest so while on the phone with her he pretends to commit suicide, which sends switchboard operator Anna (Frances Drake) into his room. It turns out that Anna has been listening to all of Julian's calls and knows everything about him. Before long Julian has a third woman after film.

LADIES SHOULD LEAVE is a pretty darn bad movie on many levels. Well, I guess I should say that it's your typical plot less "B" movie that would have been shown as the second or third feature back in the day. If you took Grant out of this picture then there really wouldn't be a reason to watch it and even with the screen legend it's hard to actually recommend this thing.

The script is a complete mess from start to finish as nothing is ever really explained and things just seem to happen for no reason. Even worse is the fact that the film is a complete bore with only a couple laughs scattered throughout its 60-minute running time. The characters are all rather shallow and boring. Even the switchboard operator is more creepy than anything else.

This Cary Grant film is not among his better known pictures...and after seeing it, I understand why. The film is amazingly shallow and light-weight...and quite forgettable.

When the film begins, you learn two things about Julian (Grant)-- despite looking wealthy, he is about to go belly up AND he is an idiot. Why an idiot? Because he meets a lady and knows nothing about her but instantly he declares that he's in love. Later, to get her attention he pretends to shoot himself...and at this point, I was really wishing he'd do it for real!! The film was contrived and repeatedly Julian was just an idiot...and needed a switchboard operator to save him again and again. A very poor script make this a film mostly of interest to huge Grant fans...but no one else. A big misfire.

An overly familiar romantic comedy, the paper-thin LADIES SHOULD LISTEN is a harmless, if trivial, addition to the genre. Neither the writing or direction is sharp enough to make the material really spark or crackle, but Cary Grant displays his increasing prowess in romantic farce, and the plot line of his character being romanced by the telephone operator who repeatedly saves him through eavesdropping is serviceable if hardly superior. The basic structure (as well as the Paris backdrop) is more than casually reminiscent of Grant's previous film KISS AND MAKE UP, only not as inspired or as energetically performed by the supporting players. Still, the film provides a solid hour of agreeable, lightweight entertainment.

I had low expectations of this post-code film after having watched Cary Grant in the previous, KISS AND MAKEUP. The entry credits for this film let everyone know that this is/was a Hays Code approved film (pretty much they started inforcing this around 1934ish). The 59/62 minute length should be the give away. If you are a quick study you can see where they have chopped this (by a startling change of scene), and likely severely edited it. During the film you can also see only one person in a bed, not two, (and fully clothed everyone.) Kisses get panned away as well. You can find a full list of the dos and don'ts on Wiki (gratis Hays in conjunction with his Jesuit accomplice.). One of the things that they did with these transition heavily edited films was to attach them to full length features either as a prelude or postlude.

A pity in this case, since the script - cut as it is - is surprisingly funny, and the lead actors managed to pull this off quite well. It perhaps also says something about the person who was tasked with the job of patching together what was left after the cutting room floor debris, since it does make a tidy little film. A delightful 1930s romp.