Behind Office Doors

This pre-code film is not quite as daring as other precode Hollywood movies, but it holds up very well today and is quite enjoyable.

Mary Astor plays a receptionsit at a paper mill company. She has her eye on Robert Ames, a young salesman with the company. When the boss is forced to retire, Mary Astor pushes for Robert Ames to take the job, and when he does, Mary is promoted to being his secretary. She is secretly in love with him, only he never seems to notice. As he rises in the company Mary Astor is constantly by his side, giving good business advice as well as advice in his personal life. When Ames marries someone else, Astor is so upset he quits, and the company begins to fall apart.

Mary Astor, I feel, has never quite gotten her due in film history. She is a wonderful actress, and watching her in a film role, you are assured you will get a natural performance that will hold up as well as if it had been shot yesterday.

Robert Ames, a former stage actor, is quite good in the role. Ames died shortly after this film. His death was thought at first to have been caused by foul play, but it was determined he had died from too much drinking.