No Man of Her Own (1932) Reviews

No Man of Her Own represented the only time that Clark Gable and Carole Lombard co-starred in the same picture (at the time the film was made, both were married to other people; their romance and subsequent marriage was several years in the offing). Gable plays a crooked cardsharp who takes it on the lam from the New York constabulary. He hides out in a small town, where he falls in love with librarian Lombard. Endearing himself to Lombard's family, Gable pretends to be an out-of-town broker. He takes his new bride Lombard back to New York, where he resumes his dishonest activities, all the while keeping his one-and-only in the dark. The fly in the ointment is Gable's ex-lover and former partner in crime Dorothy Mackaill, who threatens to expose Gable to the law. Rather than appear to be a cad in his wife's eyes, Gable turns himself in, telling Lombard that he's about to embark on a long business trip. The truth is revealed sometime before the final reel, but Lombard is willing to forgive and forget so long as Gable promises to go straight. Given the usual wiseacre urbanity of Gable's and Lombard's separate starring vehicles, No Man of Her Own seems unusually banal and sentimental. Still, the film is an opportunity not to be missed by latter-day "Golden Age of Hollywood" aficionados. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi