Gladys Blake Movies

Following up their successful film Love Affair, Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne team up again for the romantic melodrama When Tomorrow Comes, based on a story by James M. Cain. Philip (Boyer) is a concert pianist who stops into a restaurant for lunch and meets waitress Helen Lawrence (Dunne). He follows her to a rally where she is planning a strike. The two fall in love despite the fact that Philip is married to Madeline (Barbara O'Neil), who suffers from psychotic spells after a miscarriage has brought her to madness. Helen goes on strike and Philip wants to take her to Long Island on his sailboat, but they are stranded by a hurricane. Taking refuge in a destroyed church, Helen learns about his wife and is forced to make a difficult decision. When Tomorrow Comes won an Academy award in 1939 for Best Sound, mostly due to the novel hurricane scene. This is one of three films by director John M. Stahl to be remade by Douglas Sirk in the late '50s and early '60s. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide

A model of precision and economy, the MGM "B" thriller Tell No Tales represented the feature-film directorial debut of former actor Leslie Fenton. Reportedly an expansion of a "Crime Does Not Pay" 2-reeler, the story follows editor Michael Cassidy (Melvyn Douglas) as he tries to save his newspaper from being shut down by corporate fat-cat Matt Cooper (Douglass Dumbrille). Hoping to track down the perpetrators of a recent kidnapping (and thereby obtaining an "exclusive"), Cassidy illegally gets hold of one of the bills used for the ransom, tracing the bill to all its previous owners. In the course of his odyssey, Cassidy stumbles into a wake for a murdered black boxer, a haunting sequence dominated by the powerhouse performance of Theresa Harris. He also learns that the much-hated Cooper was tenously connected to the ransom bill, though the identity of the actual miscreants aren't revealed until the last two reels. Louise Platt costars as Ellen Frazier, a harried witness to the kidnapping who winds up being taken "for a ride" along with the unconscious Cassidy. Also figuring prominently in the action is gambling boss Arno (Gene Lockhart) and his weakling brother Phil (Tom Collins), not to mention musical-comedy star Lorna Travers (Florence George), the main attraction at a Policeman's benefit show (another highlight). Showing up unbilled is one Jack Carlton, later known as Clayton Moore. Tell No Tales definitely deserves to be better known. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman's whimsical Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway play You Can't Take It With You was transformed into a paean to populism by director Frank Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin. This is the story of the zany Sycamore household, presided over by Grandpa Vanderhof (Lionel Barrymore), a former businessman who has turned his back on commerce to enjoy life. At the Sycamores', everyone does just what he or she pleases. Penny Sycamore (Spring Byington), Grandpa's daughter, has become a novelist because someone delivered a typewriter to her home by mistake. Penny's husband makes firecrackers in his basement with the help of Mr. DePinna (Halliwell Hobbes), an iceman who showed up at the Sycamore doorstep one day and never left. Their daughter, Essie (Ann Miller), imagines that she's a prima ballerina, even though her dour teacher, Boris (Mischa Auer), assesses her work with, "Confidentially, it steenks!" Essie's husband, Ed (Dub Taylor), who'd rather play a xylophone than work, spends his free time selling Essie's candy, wrapping each package in paper from a used printing press that dispenses anarchistic slogans. The one normal member of the household is Alice Sycamore (Jean Arthur), in love with wealthy Tony Kirby (James Stewart).

Naturally, when the stuffy, aristocratic Kirbys come to the Sycamores' for dinner, the event is a disaster, capped with the arrest of everyone in the household. Hart and Kaufman's third act found the previously judgmental Kirby softening his attitude toward the freewheeling Sycamore clan, admitting that he's never had so much fun in his life. Screenwriter Riskin altered the focus of the play by throwing out the third act and concentrating upon Tony Kirby's father, Kirby Sr., who as played by Edward Arnold is transformed from a stock stuffed shirt into a ruthless, grasping tycoon, eager to buy up every house on the Sycamores' block to make room for a munitions plant. The film thus became the story of Kirby's regeneration at the hands of the carefree Sycamores. Enough of the play's screwball elements are retained to compensate for Riskin's speechifying and plot distortions (though the softening of one of the play's vital ingredients, Grandpa's refusal to pay his income tax, borders on the sacrilegious). You Can't Take It With You earned several Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director (Capra's third Oscar). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Inasmuch as the film was based on a novel by Swedish author Sigrid Boo, Fox's Servant's Entrance is logically set in Sweden. Heiress Hedda Nillson (Janet Gaynor) certain that her family is about to lose all its money, takes a job as a maid. After the usual trials and tribulations, Hedda falls in love with humble chauffeur Eric Landstrom (Lew Ayres). When it turns out she's not going to go broke after all, Hedda despairs, believing that she will be forced to give Eric up -- but of course nothing like that ever happens. The highlight of Servant's Entrance is an animated nightmare sequence, courtesy of Walt Disney studios, wherein poor Hedda is "attacked" by a barrage of anthropomorphic pots and pans (Disney's previous contribution to Fox Studios was a futuristic television sequence in the 1933 Lilian Harvey vehicle My Lips Betray). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The charming and effervescent continental film star Lillian Harvey made her Hollywood debut in My Weakness. Borrowing a page or two from Pygmalion, the plot is hinged on a wager made between playboy Ronnie Gregory (Lew Ayres) and his crusty uncle Ellery (Henry Travers). Ronny bets that he can transform kitchen slavey Looloo Blake (our girl Harvey) into a fashionable society belle, which he does -- but he hadn't counted upon falling in love with the girl along the way. Supervising the proceedings is baby-faced comedian Harry Langdon in one of his best talkie roles as a whimsical Cupid. Clearly inspired by the Lubitsch and Clair musical semi-fantasies then in vogue, My Weakness is replete with rhyming dialogue, talking animals, and even a singing statue of Auguste Rodin's The Thinker. The Buddy G. DeSylva-Leo Robin-Richard Whiting score is largely unmemorable save for Gather Lip Rouge While You May, which deserves a gold star for the title alone. My Weakness was the first of three Lillian Harvey vehicles for Fox Studios, filmed back-to-back to accommodate her busy European movie schedule. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

When a patient dies of heart failure, society doctor Michael Travers (Lew Cody), takes an interest in her 14-year-old daughter Judy (Sally O'Neil), whom he makes his ward. Against the wishes of his fiancée, socialite Diane Manners (Aileen Pringle), Michael leaves for an extended business trip to Europe. Upon his return three years later, the good doctor falls desperately in love with his now fetching teenage ward, and is angered by the news that she is engaged to young Dick Manners (Edward Morgan, Diane's brother. When Judy agrees to delay her upcoming wedding, a furious Dick crashes his car. Badly hurt in the accident, Judy is saved on the operation table by Michael, who begs her forgiveness. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

I Have Lived takes place in a New York penthouse, a Broadway theater, and a seedy speakeasy, though not necessarily in that order. Alan Dinehart essays one of his rare leading roles as Thomas Langley, a brilliant playwright whose career has taken off like a skyrocket. Experiencing an attack of hubris, Langley decides to cast an unknown in his next play. His selection is the gorgeous Jean St. Clair (Anita Page), a woman with a tawdry past. Wanna bet that the opening-night audience will give the young actress a standing ovation despite her checkered history? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide