I Met My Love Again

Have you ever watched a film that you were enjoying only to wonder, abruptly, if the writer went nuts? This is EXACTLY the way I felt with "I Met My Love Again". It's a dandy film through the first 80%--not perfect, but enjoyable. But then, in the finale, I almost wanted to scream because the film became a stupid and incomprehensible mess! So beware--the ending is just awful.

The film begins with Julie (Joan Bennett) and Ives (Henry Fonda) falling in love. However, he's in school and their engagement is quite prolonged. One day, Julie meets a very exciting author and he sweeps her off her feet--marrying her even though they barely know each other. Well, not surprisingly, he turns out to be a horrible husband and soon dies--leaving her without money but with a child (who is a real brat). With some money sent to her by her aunt, Julie returns home for the first time in a decade. Not surprisingly, when she sees Ives, their reunion is rather cold and she decides it's probably for the best to just leave town for good. However, when they see each other again, despite the years and hurt, he declares his love for her and they SHOULD have a happy ending, right? Well, perhaps eventually, but in the meantime all sorts of contrived monkey wrenches are tossed into the picture--and MANY folks try to prevent their marriage. To make it MUCH worse and utterly ridiculous, Julie decides to deal with one of the problems in one of the most insane and stupid manners you can imagine....no, I doubt if you can imagine just how nuts her behaviors are...yet, inexplicably, she's NOT placed in a psychiatric institution! What, exactly, happens in this ending? Well, see it for yourself...but don't say I didn't warn you. Overall, a decent film that becomes stupid very, very quickly.

No need to recap the tangled plot.

No surprise to me that the clunky soap opera has generated so few reviews despite headliners like Bennett and Fonda. The various entanglements, both romantic and attitudinal, mount up without really developing, creating a crowded field for a comparatively short runtime. Likely, the jumbled storyline results from not one, but three directors, each likely with his own preferences. Certainly, someone liked big close-ups of the lovely Bennett who dolls up the otherwise drab proceedings. Unfortunately, Fonda's role as a stodgy professor doesn't help the lacklustre romantic appeal, and is a long way from his usual compelling charm. Then too, the cheap creek-side sets distanced me right away from their intended romantic setting. Clearly, it's an overall cheap and jumbled production that I expect both stars preferred to forget. Fortunately, both went on to bigger and much better things. No need for me to go on, except to say skip it unless you're a die-hard Bennett fan.

There was no way Henry Fonda was going to get top billing in I Met My Love Again, not playing opposite the boss's wife. Fonda was just getting his film career into high gear when he appeared with Joan Bennett who would soon marry producer Walter Wanger. And quite frankly this is what was euphemistically called back in the day, a woman's picture.

Truth be told I can see why Joan gave into temptation and ran off with charming, but dissipated writer Alan Marshal. Fonda quite frankly is something of a dolt back in their college days in courting Bennett. But after ten years when Marshal gets rather stupidly killed in an accident at a party, Bennett packs up their 10 year old daughter Genee Hall and heads back to Vermont to hook up with her old friend who is now a cynical and unhappy biology professor at their old alma mater.

In staid old Vermont Bennett's running off with Marshal was a town scandal and a lot of forces seem to be against them. Spoiled and rich coed Louise Platt and her jealous boyfriend Tim Holt and there's Fonda's mother Dorothy Stickney. And her daughter can't see anyone else in daddy's place.

I Met My Love Again didn't slow down the careers of either Bennett or Fonda, but it seems to have trouble making up its mind which genre it falls in comedy or drama. It never really lives up to the mark in either.

Joshua Logan was promoted from dialogue director to co-director for this clunky soap opera, probably on the basis of his connection with co-star Henry Fonda -- Logan had directed him when they were students at Princeton.

The story, about how Fonda and Joan Bennett had been lovers in college, then had separated for a decade, she to Europe and motherhood, he to academia, has some fine points, including the performances -- the actors are straightforward and believable. However, the details of the production overwhelm this winning simplicity, including distractions from the set design and an over-the-top score by Heinz Roemheld.

There's a fine supporting cast who are permitted to emote strongly; May Witty as Bennett's aunt, Alan Marshall as her wastrel husband, Louise Platt as the student who loves Fonda and Tim Holt as Louise's would-be boyfriend. However, they all seem a distraction from the central story and characters and render this watchable for the stars but little else.

Henry Fonda and Joan Bennett star in "I Met My Love Again," a 1938 film featuring Dame May Witty, Alan Marshal, Louise Platt, and codirected by Josh Logan, Fonda's buddy from Princeton.

Julie and Ives (Bennett and Fonda) become engaged while in college, but Ives doesn't want to get married until he amounts to something. One day, Julie and a friend go to buy him a birthday gift; there's a tremendous rainstorm, and Julie, her car turned over, stops at the home of a writer (Marshal). He's impetuous and funny, and planning to move to Paris. They marry and do just that.

Ives becomes a local professor; Julie and her husband have a daughter, Michael, but basically she's unhappy. Her husband doesn't do much writing but a lot of partying, and he's constantly getting into fights. One night, he and another man have a pistol duel, and he's killed.

Julie eventually returns to her home town with her daughter and connects with Ives again, but a lot of people are against them, his mother for one. And a student of Ives (Louise Platt) has fallen in love with him and wants to marry him.

I saw a really bad print of this. It's a sweet film and the leads are very attractive; if I'd been Fonda's student, I'd have fallen for him too. He was pretty adorable. They made a good couple.

"I Met My Love Again" is just not much of a film. It's pleasant but not memorable. If you see it, see it for the leads and the always delightful Dame May Witty.