This Man Is Mine

This has a great cast. Ralph Bellamy is always good and here he is not an object of ridicule. Of course, I watched it for Irene Dunne. And she is the fulcrum of the piece, looking mousy but acting like a tigress. Sidney Blackmer, who became a distinguished stage actor, is convincing and quite attractive as a rich bad boy.

The two standouts are Kay Johnson as Dunne's sister-in-law and the fine actress, also a marvelous stage performer many years later, Constance Cummings.

The Cummings character is the best developed and most interesting. Just back from a divorce and ready for trouble, she is like a character from "The Women." Her role is a bit more well rounded than the characters in that movie.

Fast paced and pretty good dialogue throughout, plus runs about 1 hr 15 min.

The women are given the best lines -- sharp, funny, and often catty. Though their characters are quite minor to the story, I enjoyed the lines between husband and wife Slim and Rita, or "Cookie" and "Pookie" as they called each other. It was quite funny to hear them call each other by such cute little pet names, followed by a jab or barb or criticism! I don't think they said one nice thing to each other! The other supporting couples in the flick were always snapping at each other too -- Bea and Jud, and Fran and Mort.

The two main characters, Toni and Jim, are very much in love and exhibit some nice friendly banter at the beginning of the movie. This doesn't last for long as Jim's ex-fiancé, Fran, breezes into town, freshly divorced with a new dude already lined up (Mort) and setting her sights on winning Jim back ... not permanently, just for a night. Constance Cummings is great as Fran! Toni suffers through Jim's infidelity and even forgives him as she wants to save her marriage and her family (they have a 2-yr-old boy). Eventually, however, she decides she's had enough and files for divorce.

What's interesting (and one of the reasons I like to watch these older movies) is the glimpse we get into how things were done back in the day. Jim asks Toni where she filed for divorce, and is aghast to learn she filed in the state they live in. From what I can gather, she could've run off to Reno (as Fran did, and as so many women in films from the 1930s did, and get what amounts to a 'no fault' divorce). But, since Toni filed in the state they lived in (New York?) where there was only one grounds for divorce - infidelity - this required her to name a 'correspondent' (i.e., the outside party whom the spouse cheated with). Fran is quite upset to learn that Toni has filed in state and has named her as the correspondent. I really enjoy these little snippets into how life used to be long before I was born. It adds to the enjoyment of the movie somehow, a little history lesson along with my entertainment.

Anyways ... back to the movie. Fran doesn't want to be involved in a scandal and, in addition, has since learned that Mortie is stinking rich, so she ups and marries him, hoping this will dissuade Toni from divorcing Jim (and naming Fran as correspondent). Jim comes crawling back to Toni and the movie ends with them kissing (presumably Toni's going to take him back). I'd have liked to see Toni kick Jim to the curb, but alas it looks like she's going to take him back instead.

Toni was played wonderfully by Irene Dunn, and Jim was played by Ralph Bellamy. It was nice to see what the old coot from Trading Places looked like back when he was a young man.

Pretty good, not great, but I wasn't disappointed that I watched it either. This movie appears on TCM (Turner Classic Movies) every once in a while.

IRENE DUNNE may have had a blossoming film career that led to much better things in the '40s, but her early '30s films were potboilers and this sophisticated comedy among the idle rich is one of them.

It's a thin comedy about a catty woman who threatens the happiness of IRENE DUNNE and RALPH BELLAMY, coming between them to the point where Dunne is all ready to sue for divorce until the woman (CONSTANCE CUMMINGS) turns to SIDNEY BLACKMER for her marriage partner. The script is full of catty one-liners but none of it is worthy of Dunne's presence. She did much better with screwball comedy material that came later.

A serious waste of time with a weak first half-hour that only picks up steam when Constance Cummings enters the scene. Ralph Bellamy is a bore as a bumbling husband in one of his rare leading man roles.

Summing up: Only for serious Irene Dunne fans.

There are three terrific women's roles in this nifty little comedy/drama that stars Irene Dunne as a loving wife whose husband (Ralph Bellamy) gets involved with an old girlfriend (Constance Cummings). There's nothing new in the plot here, but the dialog is sharp, funny (catty), and fast paced. Dunne is super and gets to show off her comic and musical talents as well as her dramatic chops. Cummings is wonderful as the bitch girlfriend who uses men like Kleenex. Bellamy is solid in a rare starring role as the dumb-cluck husband. Kay Johnson (the star of early DeMille talkies) has a great role as the droll neighbor. Sidney Blackmer is terrific as a smarmy boyfriend Cummings is stringing along. Charles Starrett (usually seen in Westerns), Vivian Tobin, and Louis Mason are good in support. But what really lifts This Man Is Mine a cut above other women's pictures of the day is the stingingly funny dialog among the three female stars. It's a total joy to watch Dunne, Cummings, and Johnson snap and claw at each other in a vein similar to The Women and First Lady (an underrated Kay Francis comedy). I still think Irene Dunne may have been the most versatile actress of the 1930s, and gorgeous Constance Cummings should have been a much bigger star. This film is not to be missed!

Irene Dunne plays Chopin and Hoagy Carmichael, paints landscapes, and has a toddler by husband Ralph Bellamy, whom she loves. Along comes Constance Cummings. She used to be engaged to Bellamy -- presumably before Miss Dunne married him -- and had abandoned him. She proceeds to wrap him around her finger and makes Bellamy ask his wife for a divorce.

This looks like it snuck in just before the Code descended on Hollywood, and while it starts off treacly and annoying as you wonder how Bellamy can fall for Miss Cummings' BS again, by the third act you accept that he's a fool. That's because Miss Dunne has decided to give him a divorce, but in New York State, where the only grounds are infidelity, and while Miss Collier enjoys taking other women's husbands from them, she doesn't think it polite for anyone to mention it. There's also the fun of Charles Starrett called up to act, and doing a decent job of it under the direction of John Cromwell, and Sidney Blackmer, before he became typecast, as a smug brute.

It's the sort of film I don't much care for, and it takes a while to get moving. However, by the end of it, it's a lot of fun.