HOLD YOUR MAN
US, 1933, 87 minutes, Black and white.
Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, Stuart Irwin, Dorothy Burgess, Gary Owen, Elizabeth Patterson.
Directed by Sam Wood.
Hold Your Man is one of many star vehicles for Jean Harlow during her short time at MGM as the blonde bombshell, dead at age 26 in 1936.
She co-starred in a number of films, Red Dust, Wife vs Secretary, Saratoga, with Clark Gable who was emerging as MGM star – though he won his Oscar the next year for Happened One Night on loan to Columbia.
He plays a con man with a crooked smile, the audience seeing him do his cons on the street, taking refuge from the police in Jean Harlow’s apartment – and she in a bubble bath. (The screenplay was cowritten by Anita Loos, author of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, who also wrote The Girl from Missouri for Harlow the next year). The two fall for each other but all is complicated by her relationship with a good patron, Al, Stuart Irwin, a dead body, and both of them going to jail – the complication being that Jean Harlow is pregnant. There are some effective scenes for her in the prison episode.
A lot of smart lines thanks to Anita Loos, the strong screen presence of the stars in a typical enough story from the 1930s.
1. Popular vehicle for Jean Harlow? Clark Gable? Together?
2. Black-and-white photography, New York settings, apartments, the streets, restaurants, prison? The musical score? The title song, the ballad and the style sung by Jean Harlow?
3. Title, the touch of comedy and irony?
4. The focus on Ed, the comments on his crooked smile? The conman, with his partner, Slim, the con in the street and the repercussions, the police? His hiding in Ruby’s apartment, in the bath, Ruby holding off the police? The attraction? His continued activity, the group and the plans, his driving the car, everything going wrong, the dead body, his going to prison? His reform? The continued love for Ruby?
5. Ruby, seeing her in the bubble bath, Jean Harlow’s screen presence, shielding Ed, going out with Al, her leading him on, yet his being led on willingly, financial support? Seeing Ed in the restaurant, going to the table, the introductions? The attraction to Ed? Meeting up with him? Yet Al always in the background with support and money?
6. The body, the accusations, arrest, the charge of manslaughter, her going to prison, the woman in charge, treatment of Ruby, interactions with people in the jail, the African -American woman and her preacher, Ruby discovering she was pregnant?
7. The character of Al, a nice man, attracted to Ruby, always supportive, no matter what?
8. Getting out of prison, meeting up with Ed, her pregnancy, the happy ending?
