Lits jumeaux

'Twin Beds' (1942) starring George Brent and Joan Bennett is hardly a classic comedy in the league of 'The Awful Truth' or 'My Man Godfrey', but a pleasant enough marital mix-up comedy involving three newlywed couples living in one apartment building.

I was surprised at George Brent's performance. He's such a cold fish in all those Bette Davis movies (which is why Bette loved him.....he would just stand there while she acted rings around him), so I didn't expect him to make much of a comedy role. But he was quite amusing, even doing several slapstick bits very well.

Joan Bennett, I think, was at her loveliest in the early 40's, and she's very cute and appealing. Not generally thought of as a comedy actress, it's a shame she didn't get the chance more often in better films, because she handles herself well in the madcap situations, giving a fresh, sparkling performance.

Mischa Auer plays an eccentric Russian singer and pianist, a role quite similar to the one her played in the superior 'My Man Godfrey'. He pretty much steals the picture from all involved, although the supporting cast includes such well-seasoned professionals as Una Merkel, Glenda Farrell, Ernest Truex, Margaret Hamilton and Cecil Cunningham (best known as Irene Dunne's aunt in 'The Awful Truth').

I'd recommend it to anyone who's a fan of one of the stars, but it's pleasant enough that most everyone might enjoy it.

This is truly one of the worst films ever made by a major studio. It's shockingly bad, for the cast consists of first-rate people, and the year, 1942, was filled with the glories of filmdom that began in the mid 1930s, including the screwball comedy.

Somebody at United Artists decided to take a lousy although moderately successful play and turn it into a film. The script doomed the movie from the beginning. George Brent does the best he can with his part; indeed, one could argue that he was never less wooden. Joan Bennett, as beautiful as ever, is playing the Myrna Loy role, but there just isn't enough in the script worth her talent. Mischa Auer as a major comedian is a disaster. He is wholly unfunny and irritating. At one point, the director had him imitate the Harp Marx bit with the mirror. This flops too. Glenda Farrell and Una Merkel are simply wasted in the film.

There is nothing amusing in this "comedy," and no reason to see it. The actors must surely have been embarrassed. This viewer was.

Despite the support of some great comedic character actors (Mischa Auer, Una Merkel), the leaden presence of George Brent sinks any chances of this movie being very funny.

Joan Bennett is cute and funny, but she can't carry the whole load on her petite shoulders.

Stiff, wooden, and uncharismatic, Mr. Brent was extremely adequate in a number of fine dramas. For comedy, his presence in the cast is the kiss of death.

George Brent wants to spend quiet evenings at home with new wife Joan Bennett, but she's throwing a party. There's Ernest Truex and his new wife, Una Merkel, who knows about her husband's long friendship with Miss Bennett; and there's jumped-up singer Mischa Auer and his wife, Glenda Farrell, and he is a Lothario with designs on Miss Bennett. It reaches the point where Brent walks out.

It's based on a stage farce by Salisbury Field, and the third act concerns everyone winding up in the Brents' apartment for the usual farcical reasons, with Truex and Auer in their skivvies, for the usual farcical reasons, while Miss Bennett tries to cover it all up, for the usual farcical reasons.

It can and should work with these players; Miss Bennett was perfectly capable of acting as daffy as anyone, and the other two ladies were excellent at being skilled and sexy. In fact, it probably does work -- on a stage with three rooms arranged like a railroad apartment, with lots of slammed doors covering entrances and exits, performed with clockwork precision in about ten minutes. It does not work in 22 minutes, and editing cuts that break up the continuity and destroy the zany clockwork precision that is the hallmark of this sort of stage farce.

Producer Edward Small was reviving old farces for release through United Artists in this period, so for the others in the series UP IN MABEL'S ROOM, GETTING GERTIE'S GARTER, and BREWSTER'S MILLIONS. They were zippy and funny, and the last is a classic. Not this one.

"Twin Beds" is a badly written film that I found myself disliking almost immediately...mostly because REAL people act nothing like the dopes in this movie. It begins with two very successful and well educated folks, Mike and Julie (George Brent and Joan Bennett), getting married. However, her job with the USO is so important that she's never home and they don't even have a honeymoon. All she seems to do is spend her time entertaining...everyone except her new husband that is. Anyone with a brain bigger than an ounce would see this is a recipe for disaster...so why does it take these two dopes THAT long to realize that their marriage is a mess?! While the film doesn't explicitly state it, you aren't even sure if they ever took the time to even consummate their marriage!! This comedy is about their realizing that the marriage is a mess...with her taking so long to realize it you wonder if anyone could be that stupid.

George Brent and Joan Bennett were both very accomplished actors...particularly Brent. Both also were pretty high priced talent. So why were they working for no-name Edward Small Productions? Were they being punished for something? Were they between contracts with GOOD studios? All I know is that the film was poorly written and beneath their talents....seeming more like a cheap B-movie than a film you can take seriously. I find no reason to recommend this...unless I was recommending it to someone I really hated.