David Landau Movies

In this romantic drama, a strait-laced preacher creates controversy when he marries a seductive trapeze artist . The two meet after the swinger is injured during a performance and taken to his home to recover. Love blossoms while she heals and they surreptitiously marry. When the minister's snooty parishioners find out, they are shocked evict him from their chapel. When he is unsuccessful at finding other work, his wife selflessly returns to the circus so he can have his congregation back. This leads to the story's upbeat conclusion, but not before some exciting aerial antics ensue. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

An early comedy about the generation gap, this 1932 movie was written by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, who went on to write and direct films such as Guys and Dolls and Cleopatra. Director Frank Tuttle co-wrote the script, based on a successful play called The Goose Hangs High by Lewis Beach. Donald Ingals (Richard Bennett) and his wife Eunice (Frances Starr) are conventional and loving parents who are shocked when their son Bradley (Buddy Rogers) comes home from college with ideas that they consider to be outrageous. His parents would like him to get involved with Mary Burke (Peggy Shannon), a prim and proper young lady. More complications ensue because Bradley's sister Lois (Frances Dee) is attracted to the flapper lifestyle, but she isn't sure whether she can handle its emotional demands. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide

Based on a Mary Roberts Rinehart novel, I Take This Woman stars Carole Lombard as the spoiled daughter of a wealthy rancher. Lombard impulsively marries cowhand Gary Cooper, a poverty-stricken employee of her father. Cooper insists that they live on his income in a tiny shack; Lombard gives this new life a try, but eventually balks and walks. Cooper joins a travelling rodeo, and is badly hurt during a performance in New York--where Lombard is in the audience. Having eaten several slices of Humble Pie, Lombard rushes to her ex-husband's side, and all is well. I Take This Woman bears no relation to the 1940 Spencer Tracy/Hedy Lamarr soap opera of the same name. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Elmer Rice's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Street Scene was purchased for the screen by producer Samuel Goldwyn in 1931. The entire story takes place on the street in front of a foreboding old New York brownstone, between one evening and the next afternoon. The individual fates of eight neighboring Manhattan families intertwine during this brief stretch of time. Special emphasis is given the Maurrant family: the philandering mother (Estelle Taylor), the drink-sodden husband (David Landau) and long-suffering daughter Rose (Sylvia Sidney). When the husband catches the wife "in the act" with bill-collector Russell Hopton, the resulting tragedy is not shown, but reflecting in the wildly varying reactions of neighbors and passersby. Though resisting the temptation to "open up" the play, director King Vidor nonetheless injects his cinematic know-how into the proceedings, by utilizing an entirely different camera setup or angle for each individual "take." The cast of Street Scene includes several carry-overs from the Broadway original, including David Landau, Max Montor, Matt McHugh (brother of Frank), John Qualen, George Humbert, Tom H. Manning, and Anna Konstant (Sidebar: Shirley Kaplan, the role played by Ms. Konstant, was portrayed in the London production of Street Scene by Greer Garson). Unavailable for TV for many years due to legal tangles, Street Scene was freed up for the small screen when it lapsed into public domain in the early 1980s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide