The great thing about Turner Classic Movies is that no matter how many old movies you have seen, you will regularly come across actors and actresses whose names you have never heard before, but once you see them, are fascinated, and glad to make their acquaintance. So it was with the beautiful and oddly named Helen Twelvetrees. She was a very good blond actress whose career barely spanned the decade of the 1930's. Here, in "Young Bride", she is delicate and vulnerable, but not in an annoying weak way; she has a face full of beautiful character, one that you want to comfort and murmur to how everything will be alright. A lovely find, and too bad she was not a major star.
On the other hand, I have never been a fan of Eric Linden, who plays her immature braggart of a husband. I think it is that horrendous Bronx accent of his; even when he is playing sympathetic, which is rare in this film, I just don't find him to be all that appealing. I don't think I was the only one who felt this way, as his career dried up quickly as the 1930's moved on.
A very interesting cultural aspect of this film is how so much of it takes place in a "dance hall"; this is a public tavern where men came and bought tickets to dance with the female hired help. It appears that there was a great demand for these kinds of establishments, as a way for men to meet girls and socialize in a pre-TV and pre-Internet Depression-era society. Particularly fascinating is that it seems that at a certain weird level, open lewd behavior was strictly prohibited; at one point in this film, the fellow who is in charge of watching the dancers sternly calls to Eric Linden to "keep your feet moving"! (ie - no hanky-panky on the floor!) I wonder if such places really existed. Certainly this is a portrait of an urban America that died a long long time ago...
When not in the dance halls or Twelvetree's apartment, most scenes take place in a public library. Isn't that a weird combination? Throw in the fabulously stuttering Roscoe Ates as a bartender and you have a unique, slightly odd movie that, primarily thanks to the delightful screen presence of Helen Twelvetrees, is worthy of an hour and a quarter of your time.
