Hands Across the Table

CAROLE LOMBARD and FRED MacMURRAY have chemistry in this warm romantic comedy about two people who are actually yearning to marry into wealth, but find that love conquers all. RALPH BELLAMY as "the other man" makes it a certainty that Lombard will fall in love with MacMurray for the final reel, so there's no guessing as to how it all turns out.

But Mitchell Leisen keeps the pace brisk for the running time of an hour and twenty minutes, the script that Norman Krasna and others penned is bright and funny, and everyone is seen to advantage. Lombard has probably seldom had such beguiling close-ups and she was a true, classic beauty with a flair for this brand of romantic comedy. MacMurray too has a deft touch with light material and is a good match for her as a playboy who'd rather fall in love with a rich woman but changes his mind when he meets Lombard.

Director Leisen can be proud of his career, which included gems like this and serious dramas like "Hold Back the Dawn" and "To Each His Own." He's probably one of Hollywood's most underrated directors and is in good form here.

The supporting cast gets a lift from RUTH DONNELLY and WILLIAM DEMAREST.

Summing up: Enjoyable nonsense, it's formula fluff given substance by a clever script and fine direction.

Fred MacMurray's line readings here are simply impeccable--on par with, oh, say, Cary Grant in His Girl Friday. Another not wholly sympathetic leading role in a comedy. Unfortunately, the movie ends up being kind of muddle-headed toward the end. Still, the chemistry between the two stars is fully evident, and I like that the movie doesn't crassly gloss over the Bellamy character's hurt and resentment. It gives the movie body. The domestic scenes between Lombard and MacMurray are particular good--sort of a warm-up, too, for what Liesen does with Jean Arthur and Ray Milland in their glorious cohabitation scenes at the Hotel Louie in Liesen's Easy Living. Liesen is an unfairly forgotten director of romantic comedies. Besides this one, and Easy Living, check out also Remember the Night and Midnight.

Once again Ralph Bellamy plays the sad sack role, and here he has the added burden of not being able to walk. Robert Osborne called this role a "Ralph Bellamy" role and who more perfect for the ignored/dumped love interest than he? He is infatuated with hotel manicurist Lombard (sparkling as always) and is rich into the bargain. However, she falls for playboy MacMurray, whose family has lost its money, and who is looking to marry into it so he can continue his aimless yet pampered existence. Lombard wants to marry money, too, but curiously overlooks puppy-eyed Bellamy in this regard. The plot involves MacMurray missing the boat he is taking to Bermuda while his fiancée's family plan the wedding. He misses the boat due to a zany night out with Lombard and ends up needing to board with her for the week so his fiancée thinks he's in Bermuda. The usual falling-in-love-despite-themselves ensues.

This is called a screwball comedy, but I found it more sad than comical, especially with the character Bellamy plays. MacMurray has no sex appeal for me despite workable chemistry with Lombard. I cannot help but picture the pipe-puffing, cardigan-wearing dad, Steve Douglas, on "My Three Sons," and how utterly dopey he looks works against his being taken seriously as a sexy guy. No one has yet mentioned that William Demarest, who later played Uncle Charley on "My Three Sons" with MacMurray, shows up as a suitor to take Lombard out who gets cosmetically chased away by MacMurray in one of the funnier scenes in the film.

Tragic Marie Prevost plays Lombard's manicurist pal Nona. I thought she had a fine comedic presence, and it's a shame she didn't go on to more best-friend, Patsy Kelly type roles.

I don't think this is one of Lombard's best but not a complete waste of time. Not as zany or fantastic as "My Man Godfrey" but watchable nonetheless.

"Hands Across the Table" is a sparkling and enjoyable screwball romance, directed with an airy grace by the underrated Paramount stylist Mitchell Leisen, whose "Easy Living"(1937) and "Swing High, Swing Low"(1937) are two of the greatest classics of the 1930s. "Hands" is a minor work to be sure, but it is enjoyable and worthwhile for showcasing the comedic talents of Carole Lombard as the gold-digging manicurist who falls for a former millionaire playboy, played by Fred MacMurray. Ralph Bellamy plays Lombard's rejected suitor, a role that somehow prefigures his role in Hawks' "His Girl Friday".

Carole Lombard was one of Hollywood's finest comediennes; she worked best when she was backed by an equally strong male lead – in this case, it's Fred MacMurray, with whom she must have clicked because they appeared together three more times (two of these films, THE PRINCESS COMES ACROSS [1936] and TRUE CONFESSION [1937], are also included in Universal's 2-Disc Lombard collection and I should get to them in the next couple of days).

The comic style of the film falls somewhere between sophisticated and screwball: lavish settings and stuffy aristocratic characters are mingled with the often zany working-class (keeping their chin up during the Depression but, in Lombard's case, harboring a desire to marry into money); the title refers to her job as a manicurist. Typically for this type of film, when she sets her eyes on a gentleman of title – who's young and handsome to boot (MacMurray) – he turns out to be engaged to an even wealthier lady (Astrid Allwyn), because he's himself penniless! Running after her (the term is put lightly here, since he's actually wheelchair-bound) is an ex-air ace played by the actor who cornered the market around this time in "Other Man" roles, Ralph Bellamy, who's naturally got a lot of money and thinks of Lombard as a perfect match – but his love goes unrequited.

The mixture includes slapstick, wisecracks, romance, drama and even a bit of sentimentality (Lombard spends a good part of the last act sobbing). Still, as always in these more innocent times (where, for instance, a woman has to turn around when the man she's living with – albeit platonically, for the moment – is about to wear his pants!), none of the characters are really unsympathetic…so that we don't even despise the jilted lovers, who are understanding enough to know when to give up. The ending of the film is a classic: Lombard and MacMurray cause a traffic jam to look for a missing penny on which they've staked the course of their future! Appearing in one scene as a prospective boyfriend of Lombard's (whom MacMurray scares away) is future Preston Sturges regular William Demarest.

The film was shown in the early 1990s on late-night Italian TV in its original language with forced Italian subtitles, but I had missed it (the same thing is true for the afore-mentioned THE PRINCESS COMES ACROSS and MacMurray's other film with Leisen – TAKE A LETTER, DARLING [1942]); I did, however, acquire some of the director's other great work this way – most of which is, regrettably, still unavailable on DVD...