Too much of everything

Good movie but grossly overrated

As Good As It Gets

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Copyright 9 July 1936 by RKO Radio Pictures, Inc. New York opening at the Radio City Music Hall: 9 July 1936 (ran one week). Australian release (as a "B" feature): 7 October 1936. 75 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Working-class couple separate when wife has a yen for clothes and luxuries that husband cannot afford.COMMENT: The film has its moments, thanks to an agreeable cast, fighting their way through a script that is not nearly as amusing or scintillating as it obviously thinks it is, plus some very attractive photography (e.g. the scene in the lightless apartment) - though Miss Stanwyck is not lit all that flatteringly. Willie Best is prominently featured in the credits, though his part has been removed and is now limited to a two-shot of him entering the marriage bureau and a long shot of him in the background of same! Unfortunately, the cast is also saddled with Ned Sparks, whose monotonous cigar-faced delivery of quite ordinary lines makes them seem even slower and less funny. This character just doesn't belong in what was doubtless conceived as a light comedy of manners. Gene Raymond is more animated than usual and Robert Young is very effective as a pestiferous playboy.

I doubt you'll ever see The Bride Walks Out remade today with the message this film sends for today's woman. In fact the title isn't even factually correct because it's the husband Gene Raymond who walks out.Even at Depression Era values asking a married couple to live on $35.00 a week is a bit much. Barbara Stanwyck and Gene Raymond live on that because Raymond being an old fashioned guy and a bit of fathead insists that the woman be barefoot, in the kitchen and if possible pregnant. God help them if a kid does come along. And with all this somehow they still employ Hattie McDaniel as a maid.Quite frankly if rich department store playboy owner Robert Young were after me, if I were Barbara I'd drop Raymond in a New York minute. She wants to work and today there would be no question but that she would.Ned Sparks and Helen Broderick provide good support and a few laughs as the married couple who are best friends to the leads.Old fashioned to say the least and not in a good way.

While there's a lot of wit in this screenplay about the ups and downs of a marriage almost doomed from the start, there's really little story, and that makes this disappointing in the lists of 1930's screwball comedy. Barbara Stanwyck is a working girl who marries long-time beau Gene Raymond and at his request stops working. He thinks she's making ends meet, but in reality, she's receiving a ton of "overdue" bills and threats from the otherwise friendly Billy Gilbert to remove the rented furniture which finally occurs on New Year's Eve and brings the couple's problems to a head thanks to the interference of a drunken millionaire (Robert Young) who really has no purpose here than to provide some romantic misunderstandings in their marriage.There's a lot of witty dialog between Raymond and Stanwyck's bickering next-door-neighbors, the cranky Ned Sparks and the sarcastic Helen Broderick. They provide most of the film's humor, and the funny thing about their long-married characters who pretend to hate each other is that you know that they'd never be able to live without each other. A very funny drunken scene occurs when Young arrives at Stanwyck's furniture-less apartment and proceeds to get himself, Stanwyck, Broderick and the still present Gilbert totally tanked with Gilbert sneezing the entire time and Broderick insisting "That's one gazuntight you owe me" every time he tries to sneeze but can't.So while there's a lot to like in this sitcom like entry in the golden age of screwball comedy, there's really a lack of story and structure, even though everybody is on the top of their game. Toss in the always amusing Hattie McDaniel to throw in her two cents as a happy-go-lucky cook, and you've got a recipe for cake which unfortunately didn't rise because it was missing the flour.

... in a production that is an OK time passer but is based on entirely archaic ideas on the subject of marriage. If I'm going to watch a film from 1936, I guess I should be prepared to deal with the values of 1936, but this is just too much.Mike Martin (Gene Raymond) is an engineer who basically nags model and long-time girlfriend Carolyn (Barbara Stanwyck) into marrying him. The arguments begin at their quickie civil marriage ceremony and continue as Mike's estimate that $35 a week is enough for them to get by on is incorrect. Plus no wife of his is going to work! It's a Martin tradition. Before this film is over I felt like if it was a Martin tradition to walk a tightrope strung between high rises on your 30th birthday Mike would be up there doing it. He's not exactly a deep thinker.Meanwhile, Carolyn is stuck making Mike's maxims work. Mike gets to live the dream of supporting a wife that doesn't work, but his dream is really a mirage. Carolyn is the one that actually deals with overdue bills and the bill collectors coming to the door threatening repossession. After their furniture is repossessed and is only returned because wealthy friend Hugh McKenzie (Robert Young) pays the amount due - all happening before Mike gets home and thus without his knowledge - Carolyn decides to go to work so their budget will stretch and hide the fact from Mike. When Mike beats Carolyn home one day and discovers the truth, it is actually the knuckle-dragging groom that walks out.All through the film there is the involvement of wealthy Hugh, who loves Carolyn but wants her to be happy whatever she decides. Let me tell you, Robert Young does not play a drunk well at all. In fact he's quite annoying as drunken partying Hugh. But when he plays a sober Hugh he's a stark and pleasant contrast to the Neanderthal Mike.Now this is a 1936 production code era romance, so you know it's going to work itself out in some conventional way already, so I'll just let you watch and find out how that happens.I give this five stars because Barbara Stanwyck makes almost any film watchable, plus there are the hilarious antics of Ned Sparks and Helen Broderick as Paul and Mattie Dodson, friends of the couple who don't seem to like each other at all and can't even remember what town in which they were married. When Carolyn asks them why they get married in the first place they say "because it was raining", whatever that means.I would consider this film a take it or leave it proposition.