Too Many Husbands (1940)

Too Many Husbands recently aired on TCM. Robert Osborne introduced the film. In his introduction Osborne stated that the film came out the same year as My Favorite Wife with Cary Grant and Irene Dunne. The film did well even thought the Grant/Dunne film came out months before. The plot of Too Many Husbands is basically the same plot as My Favorite Wife only it is about a woman who married a man only to find out her first husband who she thought was dead is actually alive instead of the man marrying another woman and finding out his wife is still alive. The only difference is while My Favorite Wife is easy and enjoyable to sit through Too Many Husbands becomes tedious the moment the wife finds out her first husband is still alive.

            The opening scene of the film show Harry Lowndes (Melvyn Douglas) dictating a letter to have his former partner’s name taken off the company title. His former partner, Bill Cardew (Fred MacMurray), died the previous year. Harry’s secretary comments that Vicky, his wife, will not like the fact that Bill’s name is being taken off the title. Vicky (Jean Arthur) was married to Bill when he died and she is now married to Harry. Vicky comes into the office and the secretary was right, Vicky is not happy about Bill’s name being removed. Harry has no time to speak to her about it he has to go to an important meeting.

            The next scene shows Bill sitting in a barber shop getting his wild hair and beard taken care of. Apparently he survived when his ship went down. Bill calls to his old house looking for Vicky. Her father picks up the phone. The poor man almost dies of shock when he hears Bill’s voice. Bill asks his former father-in-law to tell Vicky to pick him up at the airport. The father relays the message to his daughter. She freaks out she does not want to tell Bill that she is remarried especially because she does not know how. Vicky tells Henry what is going on and the man passes out. Once he gets out of his shock Vicky wants him to be the one to tell Bill about them being married. Henry refuses Vicky should be the one to say something. They both go to the airport to get Bill. Bill is the happiest man when he sees his wife. He starts hugging her and kissing her as if he had been away for two weeks instead of year. He never gives Vicky a chance to say what she needs to say about her and Henry. She goes around the issue saying that Henry is living in the house with his wife and Bill does not get that meaning. Finally Vicky just blurts out she and Henry are married. Bill is obviously furious.

            After the reveal the film just goes downhill. It becomes silly and annoying rather than silly and enjoyable. Henry and Bill fight over for Vicky in the most ridiculous of ways. She puts off picking which husband she wants to be with because she likes their attention since neither ever gave her so much. What I could not stand the most in this film was the ending it did not end it was awful.

            Jean Arthur, Fred MacMurray, and Melvyn Douglas are great actors. I felt it was a shame to see them in this film with this material. Their characters were annoying. I really hated seeing Melvyn Douglas beg for a woman like a little boy vying for the cute girl’s attention when he was this fantastic sweet talker and charmer with Greta Garbo in Ninotchka. Jean Arthur the films I have seen her in she has been this smart funny determined modern woman. Here is was acting like a pain in the ass spoiled woman. Fred MacMurray is a good actor but he has yet to impress me. Needless to say he did not to impress me in this. Harry Davenport as Vicky’s father gets a ton of credit. He will always be Dr. Meade from Gone With the Wind to me. He was really funny in his scenes especially at the beginning when he gets the call from Bill.

            Too Many Husbands had some potential because the three leads are great actors. The story and the characters just fell completely flat. I was annoyed so much with the characters. I understand that sometimes characters can be silly but there is a fine line between being just right and being ridiculous. With My Favorite Wife it is obvious that Cary Grant really loves Irene Dunne he never plays games with her and she has a reason to fight for him. In Too Many Husbands Vicky does not seem to care about either one of her husbands and I have no clue why they even stuck around her they had nothing to fight for (maybe they did and I just missed it). I do hate to compare the two films but they are so similar it is hard not to. I only suggest watching Too Many Husbands if you are a fan of either Jean Arthur, Melvyn Douglas, or Fred MacMurray other than those three skip it. 

Never a Dull Moment (1950)

Never a Dull Moment had a plot I thought I would be bored with. I realized it was a comedy but I thought it was not going to be too great. I happy to say I was wrong because as soon as Irene Dunne is put on a western ranch I could not stop laughing.

            Kay Kingsley (Dunne) is a successful songwriter and composer living in New York City. She helps to organize a charity that benefits kids in Manhattan. The charity is a rodeo show with Chris Heyward (Fred MacMurray) as one of the riders. Kay’s friend notices Chris looking at Kay and Chris’s friend Orvie (Andy Devine) notices Chris looking at Kay. The two friends have them meet and Chris asks Kay out for dinner.

            As you can guess not too long later Chris and Kay are married. He takes her back to his place out west. Kay tries to keep an open mind but gets nervous as they get closer to his ranch. At first she thinks the neighbor’s nice clean house is their house. A stone’s throw away is Chris’s old house. It is not run down but it is not what Kay was expecting. Before she can walk into the house Chris’s daughters Nan (Natalie Wood) and Tina come home from school. They seem unsure of her at first then they quickly take to her. The girls show Kay around the house. As Kay walks towards the bed in Chris’s room she nearly falls through a loose floorboard!

            As Kay and Chris prepare for bed after a long day, Orvie and a whole bunch of people come banging on the house. They are there to throw the new couple a party. All Kay wanted to do was go to sleep and now she has to entertain people. Kay has a lot of fun dancing and singing with her new neighbors and friends. Chris sees his grumpy neighbor Mears looking in through the window. Mears has control of the water that flows into Chris’s house and into his land. Chris thinks the man is there because the music is too loud. Kay goes outside to bring him into the party thinking he might soften up if he is asked to join the party. Unfortunately Mears gets humiliated when he falls into some food and storm out of the house. The party does not end until early in the morning. Not too long after they go to bed Kay and Chris are woken up by some of his friends looking for him to go out cougar hunting with them.

            Kay goes back to sleep for a while when Chris leaves. The girls get up and decide to get Kay up so they can teach her how to do chores. The girls put Kay through the ringer that day. She walks in from falling down in the barn, riding a horse and falling off the horse all sore and tired. Chris comes home with a dead cougar he wants prepared for dinner. Kay goes out on the porch and gets the life scared out of her when she sees the dead animal in front of her. She goes back in the house and starts crying. Chris hugs her and she says she cannot cook a cougar.

            As time goes on Kay tries her hardest at house work. She tries cooking biscuits and they come out all weird. A high wind comes through and brings dust into the house. On that very day her writing partner Jed comes to the house. He tells her he wants her to come back to New York to help him write songs for a play. Kay’s face lights up with the thought of returning to the city to work on music again. She does not see the harm in going to a while to make some money but she tells Jed she will get back to him. Chris comes home that night completely wiped out. He tells Kay that before her he would go to bed dirty and with an empty stomach. The girls had heard that Kay might be going back to New York and tell their father. Kay walks in and says she is not going anywhere.

            Chris had gone out one day and found a watering hole on his property was bone dry. He tells Kay is going to tell Mears once and for all that he needs more water than what he is being given. Kay and the family friend Jean go into town. Some well to do annoying dude ranchers come into the store where the women are as well as Mears. The ranchers bring in their noisy annoying grandkids and they wreck the place. The ranchers tell Mears that they bought a ranch not far from him. Mears hates the thought of the those dude ranchers being anywhere near him. Kay uses this to her advantage by telling Mears Chris was thinking of selling his ranch to them because there is no water coming in. Mears quickly goes home and draws up rights to the water supply for Chris.

            The next day Chris tells Kay he wants her to go out hunting with him and his friends. The following morning Kay wakes up to find the men all gone and the real reason they brought her was so she could make breakfast. While she is alone she thinks she hears a cougar and shoots it. When Chris and the men come back they find Kay killed Mears’s prize bull. Now Chris will never get the water he needs. They argue and Kay decides to go back to New York.

            Chris travels with the rodeo again to make money. Kay and Jed have been working on material. The music is supposed to be about New York but Kay cannot keep her mind out of the west and the ranch. They both think they hear spurs clinking but that it is only their imaginations until her dog goes nuts hearing them as well. They open the door and Nan and Tina storm in hugging Kay. Orvie carried Chris up the stairs. Chris and Kay both realize they have been lost without each other and get back together.

            Irene Dunne was fabulous. And I mean fabulous as in her acting because she never acted terribly in her films and fabulous as in she was fifty-two years old when she made this film and she looked incredible. I loved how she was not afraid to get dirty and get put through the ringer as actress for certain comedic scenes. According to IMDB Dunne took over the role when Myrna Loy passed it over. There is no way in hell I could have seen Myrna Loy in this role. Dunne was so classy and sophisticated but she was not so classy and sophisticated like Loy who you cannot imagine doing a role like this. Dunne just had that great comedic touch and silliness that made her believable in the role. All I have to say about Fred MacMurray is that he was good. He did not leave an impact on me at all.

            Never a Dull Moment is a really cute comedy. It is not one of Irene Dunne’s best comedy films but she is so amazing and so funny in all her scenes. She truly looked out of place on a ranch setting and it just makes her more believable. Never a Dull Moment is not available on DVD nor is it on Youtube. If TCM airs the film again definitely watch it. 

On Our Merry Way (1948)

I was reading a review for On Our Merry Way and the reviewer said that the film is like when you read a book that you cannot get into but you have to see the whole way through to see how it ends even though the ending is predictable. I completely agree with argument on that review. The only reason I even bothered to watch this film was because Paulette Goddard was the first billed. I adore Paulette Goddard and I have already watched her in anything and two of three of those anythings have not been good. On Our Merry Way included. She was not even in the film that long.

            On Our Merry Way is about a newspaper writer named Oliver Pease ( Burgess Meredith). Well, he is not really a reporter he writes the pages for lost pets. He has never told his wife of seven months that he writes ads for lost pets. He has Martha (Goddard) believe that he is the roving reporter making fifty bucks a week. Martha gives Oliver the question for what she thinks is his next roving report- “Has a child ever influenced your life?”

            Oliver goes into work and pretends to be someone from the head office and convinces his boss to let him write the roving section. Before Oliver walks out the door he is hunted down by a goon working for a bookie. Oliver had placed a few bets and lost a lot of money. So not only is he running around town looking for stories he is now running away from some goon trying not to get the crap beat out of him.

            Trying to get away from the goon he runs into a bar. He sees two musicians Lank (Henry Fonda) and Slim (James Stewart) and asks them a question. They go into the story of how their car broke down when they were on the road. They came up with the idea to hold a band contest but the mayor’s kid that they ran into said his father would not have any because the kid would never win. Lank and Slim plan to have the kid win so they can keep the money from the show but the mechanic has another idea. His “baby” daughter Gloria is a beautiful young lady who can play all kinds of instruments. Lank and Slim were going to be the judges so the mayor’s son would win but the mechanic found Harry James and had him be the judge. So obviously the whole thing for Slim and Lank goes south and the “baby” Gloria winds up winning and going out on the road with the band.

            The next person Olivier runs into is a priest at a church. Reverend John B. Dunne (Charles Laughton) regales the story how a number of years ago he realized he was not a very good priest. People were leaving his church and he could not get through to anyone. He decided he was going to resign and leave the parish. As he was waiting a little boy came up to him saying that John had to follow him someone needed him. John was reluctant at first but he followed the boy to a house. Before John could get the boy’s name he disappeared. John was brought upstairs to a man who seems to have asthma and thought he was going to die. The man was extremely angry with John for being a priest he did not believe in religion and is outrageously bitter. The man calls John weak and John agrees with him but the man says something else that makes John turn around and begin to read the story from Kings about David and Goliath. The man is able to calm down as he listens to the story and he feels better. When John goes to leave he sees a photograph of the little boy he saw outside. The man says the little boy was his son and that he died. After this John went back to his home and tore up the letter and ever since then he has become a better priest.

            The last person Olivier comes across is a guy named Al (Fred MacMurray). Al and his friend Floyd were traveling down to Florida when they had gotten arrested and were brought over the county line by two sheriffs. When the sheriffs leave Al and Floyd think they are being held up by a gangster. They turn around and see it is a little kid called Sniffles who likes to think he is a gangster. He takes the two men to his mine where he has been living. Al asks if he has any family and he says only a rich uncle who does not like him very much. This gives Al the idea to try to find out who the uncle is so they can get money for bringing the kid back. For the few days Floyd and Al are with Sniffles he tortures them to no end with his crazy tricks. Al eventually goes into town and finds Sniffles’s uncle. The uncle has been driven to insanity by Sniffles and does not want the kid back. After some negotiation and lying Al gets Sniffles back to his uncle but the uncle wants to bring Floyd and Al up on extortion. Sniffles suggests they work their money off and Al has no problem with that once he sees the sister.

            Oliver rushes back to the office but his boss has found him out. He tears up Oliver’s write up for the Roving Reporter and fires him. As soon as he steps out of the building the goon beats up. The police bring Oliver back to his apartment. Martha brings him inside and tells him she knew all along that he worked for the lost pets pages and she was trying to push him to make more money. She tells him the reason she pushed him and gave him the question was because she is going to have a baby. In the midst of their furniture being taken away the boss comes in after having read Oliver’s report and tells him he loved it and will take him back.  

            So there you go now you do not have to watch the film. Please spare yourself the one hundred and five minutes watch another film that is better.

            Paulette Goddard only got top billing because she was married to Burgess Meredith at the time and he produced the film. She is only in it for the first ten minutes if that and the last ten minutes if that. Henry Fonda and James Stewart seemed a little out of their element doing comedy but I loved them they were so funny together. Dorothy Lamour played the “baby” in their story. I have never seen her in anything before she was not bad. Charles Laughton’s scenes depending on which version you see were originally cut because it was not comedic enough with the rest of the film. Fortunately I saw the version where his scene was kept in and I really liked him and the scene. It was the only watchable one. Fred MacMurray’s part was boring as sin. I think by the time his scene came on I had enough of the film.

            On Our Merry Way was very boring but I had to finish it. I knew what the ending was right from the moment Paulette Goddard gives Burgess Meredith the question so no shock there. Unless you are huge fans of Paulette Goddard, James Stewart, Henry Fonda, Dorothy Lamour, Charles Laughton, Fred MacMurray or Burgess Meredith absolutely skip the film.  

Double Indemnity (1944)



“How could I have known that murder could sometimes smell like honeysuckle?”

            Double Indemnity is considered one of the quintessential Noir films. Everything about it screams Noir.  

            Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) is an insurance salesman in 1938. One of his clients is a man named Dietrichson with a bored and lonely wife named Phyllis (Barbara Stanwyck). On the way back to his office one day Walter stops by Dietrchson’s house to talk about renewing his car insurance. Dietrichson is not there but Phyllis is and she greets Walter in nothing but a towel wrapped around her. When Phyllis comes downstairs (now fully dressed) Walter is completely taken by her. She asks him about accident insurance without his knowing it because he does not have enough money for it but she does and she can pay it off. Walter sees some shadiness about this plan. The next day he visits the home again and Phyllis tells Walter she often thinks about killing her husband but she never goes through it. Walter is so smitten with Phyllis he tells her he will plan the murder since he knows how they can get the insurance money without making the death look suspicious.     

            The two plan for weeks when finally the perfect opportunity arises: Dietrichson is going on a business trip and he has to take the train. What makes the whole situation even more perfect is that Dietrichson broke his leg they will make it seem he fell off the train.

            The plan works even Walter’s coworker, Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), who is known for his thoroughness believes the accident. But after a while Keyes sees through this death and hits the nail on head saying that Phyllis was working with someone else but he does not know who yet.

            Everything starts to unravel. Phyllis was never in love with Walter she was just using him for his insurance angle. Walter goes to Phyllis’ house where he will settle everything. She also had her own idea to settle things; she shoots Walter in the shoulder. At that moment she tells him now she really loves him but Walter does not believe her and gets his own revenge.

            I am not really sure how I feel about Double Indemnity. It is ranked on AFI’s list of the best one hundred films at number thirty-eight. There are some aspects like the writing by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler, Wilder’s directing, Miklos Rosza’s score, the story being told through flashback, and the cinematography can lay claim for it to be a good classic film and as an example of what a Noir film is but not as one of the greatest films ever made. The dialogue and the story was there and the direction was great but I really felt that the acting was not what it could have been from Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray. Well maybe MacMurray was good he did well going from this nice salesman to falling so hard for a woman that he was willing to commit murder to be with her. Stanwyck I have seen her act better I was not thrilled with her…. and I think I was also really distracted by her awful wig. Just about the only thing I liked about Stanwyck were her clothes which were designed by Edith Head. The only good actor I felt was Edward G. Robinson as Keyes. The question is when did the man ever give a bad performance?

            One scene I did like and thought was genius was after Walter throws Dietrichson’s body on the track and Phyllis is waiting for him in the car. When Walter gets in the car Phyllis goes to start it but the car hesitates and does not start right away. Their faces show their paranoia. My mind started racing as to what would happen if the car really did not start as I am sure was what the characters were supposed to be thinking. That was the only time out of the whole film where I was not sure what would happen next and truly engrossed in the film.

            Double Indemnity is definitely a classic film to watch. Billy Wilder is one of the greatest writers/directors to have graced Hollywood. He made a great film but somewhere it just falls flat. The plot of the story has been seen over and over again but here even though I found the acting was not so great I found it more believable and not as boring because of the actors’ portrayal of the characters. My expectations of Double Indemnity were neither high nor low I really cannot pinpoint exactly why I felt the film was flat. I am sure there is something I am missing; maybe I will give Double Indemnity another chance some time.