Car of Dreams

A good tune or two and having Robertson Hare on hand adds some sparks to this otherwise pretty run-of-the-mill production. The film is surprisingly too quickly paced for its own good for the first half hour, but once it stops rushing, it is becomes quite passable stuff, if not much else. There are some pleasant ice-skating sequences added in, probably just to buff up the running time, for they add very little to the story, but neither do they really detract from the story. It is not an awfully funny picture, and Grete Mosheim's airy-fairy performance has a tendency to get on the nerves, but it is rather watchable nevertheless.

Intriguing mild (very mild!) British musical comedy. Noteworthy mainly for the eponymous car (a Rolls Royce Phantom III coupe - those were the days when you get a RR PIII and still get change out of £2,000...) and some Brirish film stalwarts. The hero is a youthful John Mills near the start of his cinematic career; Robertson Hare has a supporting role, both trying to inject some life into a leaden script. The rather clunky back projections give some fascinating glimpses of 1930s London and the Lake District.

(Purists might quibble why the heroine (Grete Mosheim)has a German accent while her "sister" has a "cut glass" English accent) RW

Likable young John Mills plays a part in Car Of Dreams that Cary Grant would perfect over in American films. In one of his earliest films Mills plays the rich young owner's son of a store that sells all kinds of musical instruments. A rather dreamy young woman played by Grete Mosheim starts working at the store, but she doesn't meet him quite yet.

Grete loves to windowshop and dream of things that she can't afford and when she's in a Rolls Royce dealer's shop Mills is there and they take a test spin. Later on though her world gets turned upside down when the car arrives at her family's all paid for. Imagine having enough money to just plunk down and pay for a Rolls right up front. The Rolls Royce wasn't quite the expensive status symbol it later became, still it was a mark of prosperity especially in those Depression years.

Not only does he buy the car for her, but Mills assigns himself the role of chauffeur. He wants to see if she really loves him for himself or his dad's bankroll.

Car Of Dreams is yet another one of those rich boy meets girl from other side of the tracks that's a universally popular theme. It has a musical score and we get to hear John Mills sing. Mills had a pleasant voice, but Bing Crosby was in no danger. Grete's accent was popping up throughout the film with no real explanation. Robertson Hare was very funny especially trying to teach Grete the proper rhythm to rubber stamp orders.

I'm not sure the musical score was necessary, the film would have been good without it. Car Of Dreams is an entertaining piece of romantic fluff that film audiences loved during those hard times.

This film was shown about 30 years ago on BBC. It has just been shown on London Live. It is a delightful film. John Mills in his matinee idol days. Grete Mosheim may not be the best of the German actresses in exile who came to this country in the thirties but she has a rather endearing disposition, not withstanding her difficulty with English. With the support of Robertson Hare and some pleasant tunes this is a very entertaining musical.

John Mills is a young bachelor, almost ready to give up on women. They know he's due to inherit a trombone factory, and just want him for his money. Then he suddenly becomes infatuated with a girl in the street (Vera), whom he follows into a Rolls-Royce showroom, not realising that she's a penniless fantasy-shopper who likes to act as though she's on a spending spree. Her friend Molly (played by Glennis Lorimer, used for years as the face of Gainsborough Pictures) chides her for her silly habit, and gets her a job working alongside her in the trombone factory.

In the showroom, Mills secretly arranges to buy the latest model and then pretends that it has been gifted to Vera as the lucky 10,000th visitor. But he overdoes the gesture, using his influence as the boss's son to organise a hefty pay-rise for Vera, which the other girls resentfully view as an exchange of favours. (She is the only one who doesn't know Mills' identity.) So everything goes wrong before anything comes right.

You could pin the date 1935 on this film without being told. The showroom manager shows John Mills how to drive a car in just a few brief gestures. (Driving-tests started later that year.) There are unconscious touches of Fred Astaire, with scenes of luxury life as deliberate escapism from the economic depression. Also of Wodehouse, who spent this year in Hollywood, exerting a surprisingly strong influence on screenwriting. Vera is played by a newly-arrived German-Jewish refugee Grete Mosheim, who must have felt at home with the songs by fellow-exile Mischa Spoliansky that pepper the story harmlessly enough. Even the use of back-projection, to provide unrealistic scenes of happy touring in the Rolls, is firmly of its time.

A light snack with no pretensions of being anything more. And good of its kind.