The Match King (1932)

The Match King is about a man named Paul Krall (Warren William). Paul is a Swedish immigrant living and working as a janitor in the Midwestern United States. Paul is not an honest man. He has another man fired so he could get someone else a job. That someone else happens to be the husband of a girl he has been sneaking around with.

            One day Paul receives a letter from his uncle who owns a match factory back in Sweden. The uncle needs help with his factory and business. Paul decides to go back home. He makes the girl he has been seeing think she is coming with him but he plans on leaving her behind.

            At the factory Paul suggests a merger between his company and another one. He tells someone from the bank that he has vast holdings in America that he can repay the loan with. The story about the holdings is a lie but Paul is very confident he can have the company making money. Over some time the factory becomes successful. Paul wants to buy up all the match factories in the country. He really wants money and power above everything else.

            When the company becomes powerful and successful Paul comes up with the idea to play people’s superstitions by advertising it is bad luck to use one match to light three cigarettes so people will buy their own matches. Paul wants to buy into the Polish match business. He uses a woman named Sonia as blackmail. He has no fully become an immoral businessman who knows information on all the important people in Europe. He tells someone he does not even like matches and uses a lighter to light his own cigarettes. The company corners the match market in Germany. Paul now has a monopoly on matches in Europe.

            While Paul is out with a woman in Paris he sees a beautiful woman named Marta (Lili Damita) walk into the nightclub. He is completely taken with her the moment she walked in. The next day he sends Marta a diamond bracelet with a note to meet him for dinner at seven o’clock. Marta never shows and at ten o’clock she sends a messenger over with the bracelet. Marta had the messenger deliver the bracelet at that time and also had the hotel operator at the hotel she was staying at tell Paul she was on her way when in reality she had left hours before. Paul eventually finds Marta at a hotel in the mountains.

            Marta keeps herself in her room because she is mad at Paul when he shows up. She listens to a record over and over by a violinist. That night the violinist was supposed to be playing in Berlin. When her record stops she hears the violinist playing outside her room. Paul arranged for the violinist to come play for her.

            Paul is creating problems by taking out loans to take other factories over. Once again he is not worried. Even though the company is successful his finances are never very good. By this time Paul has become extremely corrupt and willing to do anything to make money. He hears about a scientist who has created a match that can be struck over and over again. To bring this new scientist on board at the company he has the current scientist sent to the asylum on false charges of insanity. Paul meets with a man to obtain fake money so he can make an expensive deal. He does not let the man go he kills him so no word of their deal will ever be known.

            Paul meets with Marta in New York City after a few years of not seeing her. He wants to marry her but she has fallen in love with the violinist while she was waiting for Paul to return.

            The bankers come to see Paul. They know what he has done. Paul cannot live with himself for all he has done in his life. He kills himself before he can be arrested.

            The Match King does not have a very happy ending nor is it a very cheerful film. It was not bad at all even though it was a moral lesson in how creed for money and power can corrupt a person. The main character is an ass and a sleaze yet I liked him. Maybe I liked him because Warren William is just awesome and I love seeing him in a film no matter how bad he is. Lili Damita was barely in the film. Warner Bros. probably had no clue what to do with her at this point in her career and just decided to stick her in this or they just wanted another name in it. Whatever the case may be I felt bad Damita had such a small insignificant role. The Match King, as I said, was good but it is not a film that I highly suggest seeing. I can only suggest watching The Match King if you like Pre-Codes or Warren William. 

This is the Night (1932)

While trolling TCM’s line up over the summer I found This is the Night with Cary Grant. I love Cary Grant I will sit through just about any film he was in especially his early films. I do not believe I have seen a Cary Grant Pre-Code film before so I had to see it and it is one I never heard of before. Not very long into the film I found myself completely enjoying it especially the acting.

            The film begins with a lavish party in Paris. Anyone who is to be known and seen pulls up. Claire Mathewson (Thelma Todd) steps out of a car only for the chauffer to close the door and rip her dress off! All she had on is her underwear and a fur coat. Claire is married to Stephan (Grant) but she has been seeing a man named Gerald Gray (Roland Young). The two almost get caught (or what they believe is almost) by Stephan when Gerald’s friend Bunny (Charlie Ruggles) comes by to bring them tickets to Venice. To get them out of a jam Bunny lies to Stephan telling him that the tickets are for Gerald and his wife… Gerald is not married. Stephan is not fooled he knows there is no wife but he goes along with their lie and decides to go along with Gerald and his “wife” to Venice along with Claire.

            Now Gerald is a bind and has to find a wife. He decides to hire an actress but the actress he wanted did not take the role for fear her boyfriend would hurt the guy. She gives the role to a young actress named Germaine (Lily Damita). Germaine desperately wants a job she needs the money. She is not the type of girl Gerald was looking for he tells her he wanted someone “spectacular”. Well Germaine gives Gerald something spectacular alright, she goes behind a changing screen and removes her clothes then she comes out from behind the screen and wraps herself around some curtains and prances around really sexily.

            Once both the couples get to Venice the fun and jealousy and love begin. Germaine and Gerald sleep in separate rooms since they are not really married. All night Gerald could not sleep so many things were keeping him awake. Claire sees that her lover is tired and she gets jealous thinking he was up with Germaine all night. To keep up the front that they are married Germaine gives Gerald a big kiss which she pretends makes her dizzy and she goes inside. Claire has had it already and tells Gerald to get rid of the girl. When he tells Germaine she has to go she throws a fit and starts speaking rapid French. She refuses to go and does not.

            Since Stephan knows what is going on he tells Germaine (without giving away that he knows) that they should console each other since both their spouses are cheating on them. Germaine looks over from the table she and Stephan are sitting and sees Gerald. To make her fake husband jealous she takes the other man’s hand. Gerald gets really jealous then he and Bunny proceed to get drunk all afternoon.

            The situation for Germaine does not go very well for a while. Gerald is really in love with her, Stephan is chasing after her to get back at his wife, and Bunny has very drunkenly professed his love for her by climbing to her balcony from a ladder.

            This is a classic Pre-Code through and through. There were so many hints of subtle sexuality such as Germaine’s little striptease, Gerald telling Germaine to stop breathing a certain way because it sounds immoral, and the running joke of Claire’s dresses constantly being ripped off by the chauffer and she stands in nothing but her under garments. Even the storyline is racy with a married woman going around with a man and her husband winds up wanting to cheat with Germaine.

            The beginning of the film starts out as a sort of little musical. When Claire’s dress rips all the people around her sing “Madame has lost her dress” and soon all of Paris is singing it as well. Even Cary Grant gets a little singing action when he asks Bunny for a key.

            I loved the cast all except for Roland Young. Compared to the suave and very young Cary Grant and the hysterical Charlie Ruggles he was not that great. Grant was so handsome. This is when he looked his best besides his roles in the 1940s and early 1950s. This was his first film he ever made and you can see already how much incredible talent he had he played the jerky husband to perfection and made it look to effortless. Charlie Ruggles is perfect as the blundering assistant. He just got funnier as the film went on.

            I have never seen Lili Damita in a film before this. Sure I have heard her name before and seen her in pictures because she was married to Errol Flynn but I had never seen her act. I thought she was fantastic especially the part where she does that little striptease for Gerald. Damita had a very thick French accent but that made her all the more appealing and adorable. I cracked up when she got angry and yelled in rapid French. Damita’s comedic timing was perfect she was so fantastic in all her scenes the way she was able to be really funny and then pull off being dramatic and sad.

            I have also never seen Thelma Todd in a film before, heck I never even knew who she was. I liked her she did not play her character to the extent that she was annoying which could have so easily happened. I will say she was a trooper for having to get her dresses ripped off a lot and that she was very sexy.

            The direction by Frank Tuttle is in the style of Ernst Lubitsch where it is a comedy that takes place in Paris and is very racy. Tuttle was not a very inspiring director his camera angles are not mind blowing or anything to brag about and he did not get as much as could have been gotten out of his actors even though they were quite perfect it still felt like there was something more underneath them that could have come out. He was not terrible he just was not the best.  I went ballistic with the blue tint at the beginning and whenever there was a night scene. It just did not flow at all with the black and white scenes.

            This is the Night would probably not even be remembered today had it not been for the fact that this was Cary Grant’s first film role. Forget that fact though if you ever see the film because it is an excellent Pre-Code with saucy, racy lines. This is the Night one of the best comedies I have seen since I started watching classic films, there are so many funny scenes and the cast delivers them perfectly. This is definitely a film to see if you love Pre-Code comedies.