Reine de beauté

Marion Davies shines in this spoof of celebrity as a country girl who comes to the big city and gets involved in a phony beauty contest. Screwball plot and great cast make this fun from beginning to end and proves YET AGAIN what a terrific comedienne Davies was. Dick Powell, Pat O'Brien, Mary Astor, Patsy Kelly, Frank McHugh, Allen Jenkins, Berton Churchill, and Helen Lowell (as the mother) are all wonderful. The bickering yeast kings (Joseph Cawthorn and Al Shean) are boring, but everything else in this comedy zings along. This one of Davies' last pictures and she was pushing 40 but she is brave enough to play half the film as the dowdy country girl. Davies was a star for 20 years and made the switch to talkies. Now she is finally being rediscovered and getting her due as a terrific comic actress. About time!

PAGE MISS GLORY (Warner Brothers, 1935), a Cosmopolitan production directed by Mervyn LeRoy, stars Marion Davies, formerly of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, making her Warner Brothers debut. PAGE MISS GLORY may not be the greatest comedy ever made, but much better than the four feature films that were to follow in general. What makes PAGE MISS GLORY succeed is its presence of the studio's own huge assortment of stock players, especially the third-billed crooner by the name of Dick Powel, having a very busy year for himself with six movie releases for 1935 alone.

Plot summary: Loretta (Marion Davies) is a country girl from Red Hook arriving in New York City's busy Grand Central train terminal where, after given some guidance from Mr. Kimball (Harry Beresford), a traveler's aide, and only $27 to her name, comes to the Park Regis Hotel where she interviews herself to Mr. Yates (Berton Churchill), the assistant hotel manager, for a job. Loretta becomes the hotel's chambermaid and teams with Betty (Patsy Kelly) cleaning rooms and assisting guests. Her first good deed goes to Chick Wiley (Pat O'Brien), a promoter, and Ed Olsen (Frank McHugh), his assistant, of Room 1762, down on their luck and four weeks behind their bill. Believing they are hungry, Loretta offers them a rejected meal from one of the other guests which turns out to be dog food. Gladys (Mary Astor), a hard-working secretary and Ed's love interest, tries her best to assist in their lack of creativity to get themselves back into business. Upon reading a full page ad in a magazine for the submission of a photograph for the most beautiful girl in the world, Ed schemes up a publicity stunt by sending a composite photo of a fictional girl he names "Dawn Glory" in hope of winning the $2500 grand prize. Much to everyone's surprise, Chick wins, but is unable to produce the girl he's promoting to Slattery Hawkshaw (Lyle Talbot), a reporter for the Express insisting on an interview with Chick's Wonder Girl. It is only when Loretta, after beautifying herself at the beauty parlor, puts on the Miss Glory Silhouette Dress does the homely chambermaid become the new American Beauty. As fate would have it, Loretta, known to all as Miss Glory, is proposed marriage by Bingo Nelson (Dick Powell) over the radio only after having seen her photograph but never met her personally (except earlier at the hotel as a chambermaid). Though Loretta is madly in love with Bingo, her life gets a turnaround when she's abducted by hired thugs, Petey (Allen Jenkins) and Blackie (Barton MacLane), out for some ransom money.

Also in the large assortment of Warners stock players are Joseph Cawthorn and Al Shean playing a couple of heavily accented rival businessmen; Lionel Stander (Nick, a Russian accented wrestler employed in the hotel baggage room); Hobart Cavanaugh (Kimball); and in smaller roles, Helen Lowell, E.E. Clive, Gavin Gordon, Irving Bacon and Jonathan Hale. Very much a straightforward comedy, the title song of "Page Miss Glory" (by Al Dubin and Harry Warren) is first heard briefly by an uncredited vocalist at a night club before Miss Glory has her daydreaming fantasy moment staring directly into the picture frame of Bingo (Powell) to come to life and sing the song directly to her.

Though PAGE MISS GLORY gets off to a great start, it grows tiresome by the time it reaches its 93 minute conclusion. As usual, the cast does its best in what they do, namely Pat O'Brien as a scheming promoter; Dick Powell appearing in pilot's uniform throughout the story; the serious-minded Mary Astor, among the many others in this all-star cast. In conclusion, PAGE MISS GLORY very much belongs to Marion Davies alone. She's has some very fine moments, especially during the first half of the story during her amusingly fish-out-of-water hillbilly type in the big city to unexpectedly become an American Beauty.

Never distributed to home video, PAGE MISS GLORY had its moments of glory when first broadcast on Turner Network Television (1989) before becoming a more permanent fixture on Turner Classic Movies cable channel. (***)

With a great cast and nice idea, 'Page Miss Glory' sparked my interest straight away. It was further interesting seeing silent film star Marion Davies, whose films took a while to be re-discovered and even in her day her personal life and relationships tended to overshadow her career (or at least thought to be), in a talkie role that was one of her last.

'Page Miss Glory' was a decent film if not a great one. It is not one that will appeal to everybody, and hasn't done, very understandably. The same, as in not appealing to everybody, can be said for Davies herself, not hard to see why again. Won't consider myself a fan of her but she has her charms. There are however a fair amount of good things while with elements that are easy to criticise.

Davies does carry the film very well, showing herself to be a charmer, a good comedienne and the ability to command the screen. The cast in fact are the reason to see the film. Dashing Dick Powell, razor sharp Pat O'Brien (very funny too) and equally funny Allen Jenkins are the standouts in support. Patsy Kelly and Barton MacLane are also good.

Further good things are a snappy script that has its fair share of hugely enjoyable moments and a lively pace. The film is never dull, is competently directed and has some decent production values. The title song is a lovely one.

Less good is the rather thin story, in terms of the basics, that does try to do too much at points, some of it and the characters don't serve much point.

Was also disappointed that Mary Astor had too little to do and Joseph Cawthorn and Al Shean are on the annoying side.

Overall, decent but not quite enough glory. 7/10 Bethany Cox

While my first impression of the movie was that it was corny, I soon saw the excessive exaggeration made for a fun movie. The country girl was the ultimate hick, the hero was the absolute best flier in the world, and Barton MacLane was at his evil best.

Enjoyed it.

Pat O'Brien once said, "I don't just want to be a fast-talking Charlie all my life." That's exactly what he is in "Page Miss Glory"--a flimflam man who is always looking for an angle. As Click Wiley, he pairs up with Eddie Olson (Frank McHugh), a photographer whose lens is in hock. They are about to be ejected from the hotel where they have been squatting when a new scheme falls into their laps.

Marion Davies plays a naive rube (Loretta) who comes to New York City. Her search for the perfect guy mostly centers around celebrity crushes, like the daring self-promoting stunt pilot, Bingo Nelson (Dick Powell). Davies' performance is the highlight of the film, but it is worth seeing the film just for the bevy of talented supporting actors.

This light-weight comedy clocks in at 93 minutes, and it feels like an adaptation of a play (which it is), but its screwball story serves up plenty of fun and feels like a cultural artifact from the mid- thirties.