La Fille et son cow-boy

This is a funny and enjoyable movie. Jean Arthur plays Molly Truesdale, a young woman that needs a break from her job and the pursuit of three fellows wanting her companionship. She signs up for a fourteen day bus trip west. The vacation gets interesting when she meets a cowboy at a rodeo. That cowboy is Duke Hudkins (John Wayne), who is smitten with her coy flirtations. There is a magical interaction between Arthur and Wayne that seems to make the black and white film glow.

Phil Silvers plays the tour bus guide. The cowboy's side kick, Waco, is played by Charles Winninger. Also in the cast is Mary Field and Jean Stevens.

Jean Arthur meets cowboy John Wayne in the 1943 comedy, "A Lady Takes a Chance." Arthur is Molly, a woman with plenty of suitors, though none is a prize, who takes a cross-country bus tour - conducted by Phil Silvers. While watching a rodeo, one of the riders falls on top of her. Turns out it's a fella named Duke (John Wayne). You can just see those pathetic guys at home flash before her eyes as she pulls Wayne toward her for a closer look. She misses her bus.

Given the current talk and late-night comic jokes about "Brokeback Mountain," this movie is extra fun. Wayne has no intention of marrying, though he loves to play the field, and accuses his rodeo partner Waco (Charles Winninger) of acting like "a wife." When Waco advises Molly to go back where she came from and forget about Duke, he sounds like a wife trying to get rid of a mistress, though he really wants to keep her from being hurt. But though Duke does a lot of flirting, Molly learns during a night in the desert that her big competition is Sammy, Duke's horse.

Jean Arthur is slightly miscast as Molly, though she was too wonderful an actress to ever come off as totally miscast. Someone like Betty Grable would have been more of a natural for the role than 40+ Arthur, but then, Arthur's talent helps her make the part her own and interesting besides. Her best scene is in the bar when she drinks cactus milk - hilarious. 27 years after his death, John Wayne is still considered one of the top 10 most popular stars, and with good reason. Tall, handsome, and rugged with a boyish smile, you can see why he'd make Arthur's heart go aflutter. He's usually not listed among favorite matinée idols because he made so many westerns, but make no mistake, Wayne was a hunk in his heyday.

This isn't your 21st century cowboy movie, but it makes for entertaining viewing just the same.

This is a movie about two people who are the least likely to couple. Our girl Molly(Jean Arthur) is taking a cross the country bus tour to clear her head of men. Seems she has three of them! They just aren't her type though.

Bring in John Wayne as Duke Hudkins. A good looking rodeo rider that runs into our Molly and thinks she would be a great one night stand. That's what he thinks. She does like him alot. He is after all, a REAL man who is unlike the other men she has met in New York. Seems rodeo men are kind of scarce there. The Duke likes women, ALOT, and has no thought of settling down. That's what he thinks. Now Molly wants him bad. How to hog tie this cowboy is the question.

This movie is cute though with an quite impossible plot, but hey it's Hollywood. Not a classic like "Devil and Miss Jones", "Easy Living" or "More the Merrier", but a good film just the same.

A Lady Takes A Chance is a pleasant easygoing comedy about a young working class woman who saves and splurges for a bus tour out west. Jean Arthur as the vacationer gets a whole lot more than she bargains for in the form of rodeo cowboy John Wayne.

The Duke literally sweeps her off her feet after literally landing in her lap. Wayne gets introduced to Arthur when he gets tossed off a bucking bronco right into the front row section where she's seated. It's an interesting courtship because the Duke has a retinue of two others who are above her in his personal pecking order. Sidekick Charles Winninger and his horse Sammy.

In fact Sammy almost breaks the two of them up. Arthur takes a horse blanket meant for him to keep herself warm during a cold prarie night while they're camped out. Wayne has to teach her a bit about western etiquette.

A Lady Takes A Chance though it came out in 1943 had to be backdated to 1938. There were severe restrictions on travel at that time, the movie going public simply would not have bought a story that was current.

In a recent biography of Jean Arthur, Arthur was quoted as saying that she liked the movie and got along with John Wayne. She also says she wouldn't have had she known of his political views. Come to think of it, a whole bunch of Arthur's leading men, Gary Cooper, Joel McCrea, and James Stewart also didn't have views that would have meshed with hers.

Charles Winninger in his one and only appearance with Wayne does well in the sidekick role. Phil Silvers has a small role as a most obnoxious tour guide. I can't imagine going cross country listening to Phil Silvers shtick for a couple of weeks straight.

Jean, good thing you met up with Duke or you should have got your money back. But for the movie going public, A Lady Takes A Chance was well worth the price of admission.

Another reviewer noted that the setting for this 1943 movie was 1938, a few years before the U.S. got into World War II. Life went on in time of war in the U.S., and Hollywood made many comedies to help relieve the home front stress and worry about the war. But the country also had rationing, reduced use of gas, and other product restrictions. So, it's not too likely that there were many bus tours around the country, as in this film. And, if there were some, the movie industry wouldn't want to be put on the spot encouraging Americans to splurge in a time of shortage. So, the time of the film taking place was just set back a few years.

"A Lady Takes a Chance" is a fun comedy romance that paired a couple of unlikely stars. Jean Arthur was one of the top female movie comics of the time, and John Wayne was known then for his long string of mostly Westerns. Wayne had ventured into comedy once before, in "His Private Secretary" (1933), and I think he did quite well. This movie showed that he could do comedy well – especially as a straight man against a comic partner.

The Arthur-Wayne pairing works very well in this movie. The Western and war film fans of John Wayne should enjoy this comedy-romance as well.