It Happens Every Thursday

Loretta Young, the toothy, huge-eyed leading lady, was known in Hollywood as "Attila the Nun", due to her evangelical Catholic faith (which extended to introducing a swear jar on set, something I'll have to implement at work) and iron will. She may have been voted the Hollywood Women's Press Club's most cooperative actress of 1950 (Bob Mitchum scooped their least cooperative actor gong), but then she always was a sassy self-publicist. Still, despite all that, and the bad press she's had in recent years for the whole Judy Lewis affair, she remains an attractive performer: ethereal and appealing in those early years, then a fitting screen mother as her fascinating looks ebbed away.

It Happens Every Thursday was her final film and it's a charming piece of Americana: something like the gentle cousin of Sam Fuller's Park Row, with a showy role for Young as the archetypal supportive wife – stoic, resourceful and loyal. John Forsythe is a New York newspaperman who buys his own small-town 'paper – the Eden Chronicle – and finds it's going to need a bit of work. The relationship between Forsythe and screen wife Young is smartly written and delightfully played, and the difficulties they face are nicely realised. The familiar baddie in such movies, a hateful, sniping little gossip gleefully ruining lives, is usually a harridan, but here you get a fey wannabe adulterer, played by Willard Wateman. The rest of the supporting cast is pretty much terrific, featuring the greatest character comic of them all, Frank McHugh, alongside Preston Sturges regular Jimmy Conlin and round-faced Edgar Buchanan, who's excellent in a surprisingly deep role. Best of all is the magnificent Gladys George (also appearing on the big screen for the final time), the most sympathetic brothel owner in '50s cinema. This blend of Johnny Come Lately and Mr Blandings could have seemed stale, but thanks to good scripting, pleasant plotting and lovely acting, it turns out just great.

This film is significant in motion picture history for two reasons. The first is that it is the final feature film appearance of Loretta Young. After this, Loretta only made television appearances. The second is that this is the last film ever made by Gladys George, who died the next year (1954).

Loretta Young and John Forsythe both do fine work here, as does the entire supporting cast, all of which are very good really. The basic story is solid enough too, but the script just isn't funny or witty enough to create the humor and engagement intended. As such the overall effect is a bit flat. Still there are enough moments in It Happens Every Thursday to check it out if your interested/curious.

"It Happens Every Thursday" is a pleasant but undistinguished film. It's a shame, as it turned out to be Loretta Young's last movie and after a long career, you would have hoped it would have ended on a higher note than this.

The set-up for this film makes no sense...though it certainly isn't without precedent. Much like in films like "George Washington Slept Here", "The Egg and I" and "Mr. Blandings Builds a Dreamhouse", the film is about some city folk giving up everything and moving to the country. However, compared to the boobs in these other films, the characters in "It Happens Every Thursday" seem to have a lot less motivation and their move is much more inexplicable. Think about it....two New Yorkers with no experience in the newspaper business use all their savings to buy a tiny paper in a tiny country town. Why? Well, we really have no idea--and this is the biggest weakness of the film.

Fortunately, apart from this HUGE plot hole, the rest of the picture is pleasant and modestly entertaining as the couple (John Forsythe and Young) try their darnedest to make a go of it. It's less a comedy...and more a slice of life. The actors in this (and the supporting cast is quite good) try their best but the picture never really rises above mediocrity.

In Loretta Young's final big screen film there are so many familiar and wonderful character players you would think this came from Frank Capra. A few in It Happens Every Spring are Capra veterans.

Loretta and her husband John Forsythe are newspaper people and they work at different papers on different shifts. It's quite a pressure filled atmosphere so Forsythe and Young decide to use their savings and buy a small town weekly newspaper.

The usual problems of city folk adjusting to small town living and small town news stories are in her. The biggest item on people's minds is the drought the community is suffering. Forsythe tries to do something about it and ends up in a public relations jackpot.

This is a pleasant piece of entertainment so reminiscent of some of the Frank Capra classics. Young picked a good one as her farewell to the big screen.