La cadette

Most of the plot revolves around a New York City department store - "Ginsberg's" - that like so many department stores up until the middle of the 20th century were run by the actual founder of the same name. There is an actual Mr. Ginsberg in the cast. It reminds me a little of "It's a Great Life" made the same year, although the sisters working at Ginsberg's here are hardly the Duncan sisters as far as teamwork and sister love. It does gives you a feel for what a dictatorship these big dynastic department stores were at that time. They apparently paid people a living wage, but a living wage was considered enough to make it sharing a room in a cheap boarding house, as sisters Mayme Barry (Clara Bow) and Janie Barry (Jean Arthur) are doing here.

The gist of the story is that Mayme and Janie are clerks at Ginsberg's. Mayme is called "The Saturday Night Kid" because she hardly ever misses going out on a Saturday night - until she meets fellow clerk William Taylor (James Hall). Mayme's personality is defined by loyalty and sensitivity when hurt by those she cares about, although she puts on a hard shell to pretend nothing hurts her. Jean Arthur, as sister Janie is the sneak. She's weak and selfish, and is capable of being a weasel and a liar to get out of a bad situation. She feels bad about it later, she just has no spine or character.

Now Mayme has fallen hard for Bill, but after he becomes a floorwalker - a big promotion in those days - he gets snooty with her and hurts her badly. She breaks up with him. Sister Janie has always had a crush on Bill, and although she doesn't outright try and steal him from Mayme, she tells some lies to make herself look good at Mayme's expense, to the point of getting Mayme possibly sent to jail! What do I mean by this and how does all of this work out? Watch and find out.

My favorite scene - Mayme is having the gang from work over to her apartment and they have a kind of dining room situation on the roof outside their window with the Brooklyn Bridge in the background. The way the conversation flows between characters is quite mature considering this is the first full year of talking pictures.

One more thing, even though to me it was a tie as to whether Clara Bow or Jean Arthur owned this picture - Clara with her wise flapper persona and Jean with this whiny unlikeable character she plays that makes you scratch your head when you think about all of the wise likable parts that were to come, Edna May Oliver sure takes the cake with an early performance as a supervisor at Ginsberg's in this, only her first sound performance. You can really see the comic potential there, and apparently so could RKO, because they snapped her up immediately afterward.

Five months later after "The Wild Party," in her second talkie, Clara Bow plays alongside Jean Arthur in October 1929's "The Saturday Night Kid." The Edward Sutherland-directed film, from the 1926 play 'Love 'Em and Leave 'Em,' shows the pair as sisters living together in New York City. Friction develops when Janie (Arthur) displays her unethical, jealous behavior. The rather stagey film contains a brief appearance of Jean Harlow in her first speaking role. Bow had gained weight after "The Wild Party" and couldn't fit into the dress costume designer Edith Head had tailored for her. Bow gave the slim dress to Harlow, who never forgot the actress' gesture.

Bow was unhappy with the direction movies was going and missed the days where physicality meant more than verbal jousting. Her weeks proceeding "The Wild Party" involved some heavy drinking and sedatives to calm her nerves. She was sensitive to the negative reviews she received from her first speaking role. Arthur, who took a brief hiatus to act on the stage as well as take voice lessons, bonded with Bow during "The Saturday Night Kid." "She was so generous, no snootiness or anything," Arthur said of Bow. "She was wonderful to me." Bow locked horns with the film's director, Sutherland. Soon after a divorce from actress Louise Brooks, Sutherland was immediately at loggerheads with Bow. The actress recalled being snubbed by him at an earlier social gathering. Sutherland, realizing this was a Bow film, admired Arthur's acting. "Arthur was so good that we had to cut and cut to keep her from stealing the picture" from Clara, said the director. The New York Times even complimented Arthur's performance, saying the movie would have been "merely commonplace, were it not for Jean Arthur, who plays the catty sister with a great deal of skill." For Bow, her future in Hollywood looked indeed perilous.

Hard-living was visibly taking its toll on Clara Bow by the end of the roaring twenties, hence her casting as Jean Arthur's wiser older sister in this disarming preCode quickie that establishes its tone of breezy amorality from the very outset when Miss Bow is required to postpone her morning bath since her friendly neighbourhood bootlegger, racing tipster & gambler Charles Sellon is using the tub to manufacture his liquor.

It's Clara who assumes the mantle of responsibility when little sister loses Edna Mae Oliver's welfare fund betting on a horse (while the film itself contains a remarkable but generally overlooked moment in film history where Bow and Arthur fleetingly get to share the screen with Jean Harlow).

In conclusion, aside from the novelty of seeing Miss Arthur boyishly bobbed as a flapper, after a nondescript career in silents the advent of talkies finally enabled to unleash that extraordinary voice.

After audiences of the 1920s had become accustomed to seeing Clara Bow portraying the carefree flapper or an aggressive woman out to get her man, this movie strays from those formulas. Confined by the limitations of the role of Mayme and the constraints of early sound films, Clara is much more inhibited and restrained in this film. That high energy personality and wonderful facial expressions that I love about her, were absent in this movie. As another reviewer stated, Clara would have been much more suited to play the role of Janie(particularly the scene where Janie steals Mayme's boyfriend) that went to a young Jean Arthur. Even when, she was several pounds overweight for a leading lady/sex symbol, Clara still manages too look great and she does well in the somewhat thankless role. Mayme is a "good" girl that has developed a cynical and hard boiled attitude from past romances gone bad. It was also interesting to see Jean Arthur play a selfish, impulsive, immature Janie(who doesn't hesitate to stab her sister in the back if her neck is on the line) after seeing her in more virtuous roles in the 30s and she turns in a good performance despite just an average script and dialogue. The Saturday Night Kid also provides an interesting glimpse into the late 20s lifestyle from riding a street car to working in a department store. Yes, 75 years ago they were doing company "pep rallies" that employees had to attend and show their enthusiasm whether they were enthused to be there or not. There are very few films that were made in 1929 with outstanding productions values and are enjoyable to watch. While this film has it's problems I think it is better than most of the early sound films that I've seen, including THE WILD PARTY with Clara. 6/10

Clara Bow stars in this early talkie about two sisters (Jean Arthur) who work in a department store and vie for the same guy (James Hall).

While Bow plays a fast girl who's always getting into trouble at work for being late, Arthur is actually the sneak and compulsive gambler (with store funds). She also has a yen for Bow's Boyfriend, Hall. That's about it for plot.

Charles Sellon plays the crooked gambler. Jean Harlow has a few lines as the friend and one scene with Bow and Arthur. Harlow and Hall would star in Hell's Angels a few years after this. Edna May Oliver in her talkie debut plays the head of personnel, and Frank Ross plays Ken. Ross would marry Arthur and become a film producer. And that's Bess Flowers trying out the reducing machine.

Worth a look for feisty Clara Bow and Jean Arthur in an odd role.