Young Man of Manhattan

Ann (Claudette Colbert) and Toby (Norman Foster) are journalists who meet, fall in love and marry. Toby meets Puff (Ginger Rogers) after one of his assignments and decides that she will be the inspiration behind a money-making story. However, when Puff is introduced to Ann, Ann has the same idea about a story with Puff as the main character. Toby throws away his yet unstarted manuscript as Ann is a far more efficient and ambitious story-teller. While she spends her time forging ahead with her career, Toby is happy to just get by. He also meets up with Puff after Ann has told him not see her again. This leads to a separation. Will Ann take him back....?...

It's an early film so the sound quality is poor and it's curious to hear Ginger Rogers speaking in a cutesy, baby-voice. Still, the cast do well and Colbert is good in the lead role. I think that they could have come up with a better title than "Young Man Of Manhattan". The film is OK.

Norman Foster and Claudette Colbert are two news writers who get married. At first all is well, but his sports work keeps him away from home, and her writing attracts attention, a column, an offer to Hollywood, and Leslie Austen. Meanwhile, helium-voiced schoolgirl Ginger Rogers, resentment at his wife's success, and bootleg liquor draw Foster's attention.

It's a competently written screenplay from Katherine Brush's novel, and director Monta Bell does a good job with the serious sections. However, Charlie Ruggles as Foster's fellow sports writer is largely wasted as the knowing observer who says nothing. Foster and Miss Colbert were married when this was made. If that added to their pairing, or it was simply good acting on their parts, I can't tell.

Foster would continue to play the young lover for a few years, then disappear behind the camera, directing mostly B pictures and television episodes. He died in 1976, aged 72.

I found "Young Man of Manhattan" on YouTube and the copy leaves a LOT to be desired. The sound quality is rather poor and the print is a bit fuzzy. Clearly the film could use some restoration work.

The film stars Claudette Colbert and Ginger Rogers is on hand in a supporting role, though you might not recognize Rogers. This is because this is a pre-makeover movie...one she made when she was a brunette and before she had voice lessons.

Ann and Tobey (Claudette Colbert and Norman Foster) are fools. After knowing each other only a few hours, they marry! But the honeymoon period is brief and the marriage seems destined for divorce court...mostly because Tobey is a moody guy who drinks and isn't good husband material. Some of this might be because she's a reporter and he's a sports reporter and his ego might not like a wife who is every bit as successful...perhaps more so. Do they stand a chance?

This is a decent film BUT I don't recommend you see it unless you find a better copy...the sound is THAT bad. Plus, the acting is only okay....especially in the case of Rogers, who I said is in a pre-makeover film and her voice is less enjoyable in this early movie.

Made at Paramount's Astoria Studio in New York, whose relatively primitive facilities took advantage of the talents that could be plucked from Broadway during the first few years of sound filming, Young Man of Manhattan gives us a marital drama about two newspaper writers, Norman Foster and Claudette Colbert (real life spouses at the time) during the latter parts of Prohibition. Marrying very quickly after meeting one another following the Tunney-Dempsey boxing match, they appear to take a rather flippant view of their marriage vows with Colbert proposing (discreetly) that they make it something of an 'open marriage', for after all, they're still quite young and what else can you expect?

It's an attitude that doesn't survive the first flirtations as jealously rears its ugly head the first time that teenage flapper Puff Randolph (Ginger Rogers) slithers onto the scene and takes dead aim at Foster. Between Puff and her husband's drinking and his general childishness, Colbert soon has had enough. The plot takes a melodramatic turn that lessons somewhat what had been an interesting look into domestic life during the Roaring Twenties.

Foster is the main figure and had a nice Pre-Code career before turning to direction, probably not a bad decision on his part as his general whininess prevented him from ever breaking through into real stardom. It served him well in this role, however. Perhaps the main points interest of Young Man of Manhattan today are the early roles provided for Claudette Colbert and Ginger Rogers (indeed, it's Ginger's first feature film, made by her at the age of eighteen). For Claudette it's a straight dramatic part, perhaps not her real strength but adequately accomplished here. Ginger, as well as Charlie Ruggles, serves as comic relief in a Baby Doll role which is right up her alley, and she does quite well with it as well as with a couple of short songs. As others have noted, she uses the Betty Boop style voice that would disappear once she got to Hollywood.

The print of the film that I saw was in very poor shape. I wonder if anything better has survived?

I know I'm second-guessing the author, but this movie is about a couple rather than one young man. In any case, it's a romantic comedy about a couple of newspaper reporters who meet at a boxing match and decide to get married shortly thereafter. Maybe too shortly, because marital problems ensue due to alcohol and money - a bad combination. The principals are Norman Foster and Claudette Colbert who were real-life man and wife at the time. I thought there should be more chemistry between the two as a result, but it was just enough to make the movie work. They get superb help throughout from Charles Ruggles, who was very funny and displayed impeccable comic timing and saved many a scene. Also in the cast, in her first full-length feature film, is Ginger Rogers, with dark hair and an irritating Betty Boop-type voice. She was almost unrecognizable at first glance.

Foster's character is as a sportswriter, and there are some fascinating shots at Yankee Spring training camp in Florida with a look at Babe Ruth and a fleeting glimpse of Lou Gehrig. There is also some footage of the Dempsey-Tunney fight in 1927. On the whole, the film was good - I gave it a rating of six. I sometimes think that an old picture may have several worthy landmarks, mileposts and noteworthy appearances, but age alone does not make a good picture. Some relics are just old artifacts.