Friday, December 25, 2009

THEODORA GOES WILD (1936)

How much you like this film will probably depend on how much you're a fan of Irene Dunne and/or Melvyn Douglas. Myself, I'm not the world's biggest Douglas fan. I've seen a number of his films and he does nothing for me. All I can ever think about when I see him is how somebody else would have done such a better job in his role. On the other hand Irene is pretty good considering she's working with a boring script.

Let's talk about the story. There's a huge fuss going all over the country about this new steaming sex novel called "The Sinner". It's a nationwide bestseller, but nowhere is the fuss bigger than in the small hamlet of Lynnfield. The local newspaper published the first chapter and it caused the righteous old ladies to go berserk and raise such a stink that the newspaper agreed to stop printing the story. In the midst of all this crazy behavior is Irene Dunne, a quiet woman who lives with her three cunts, I mean, aunts. She's also secretly the author of "The Sinner". She had no idea her story would cause such an uproar and she'll do anything to keep her secret.

Enter the annoying Melvyn Douglas who finds out her secret and is now using his knowledge to blackmail Dunne into employing him as a gardener in the hopes of...well I'm not really sure what he's hoping for. Things happen (I'm not going to give it all away) and soon Dunne turns the tables on him and is now blackmailing him! That sounds like it could be funny and when I rented it I was hoping that it would be, but instead I just got a few chuckles and that's it. I would have loved to see what Preston Sturges could have done with that story idea instead. Skip it.