THE DEVIL AND MISS JONES - CRITERION CHANNEL

This review originally written for DVDTalk.com in 2013.

Critics are fond of declaring things like, "It's the best time I had at the movies all year!" Only, when we do, it's not supposed to be about a movie that is over 70 years old.

Except some times it's true. I've had a rough time with movies in 2013. I've felt like I've disliked more than I've liked, and what I have liked, it's usually come with reservations. Let's hope that 1941's marvelous The Devil and Miss Jones is the true break to that negative streak. An efficient, unadorned comedy, The Devil and Miss Jones is a delight from start to finish, inviting viewers to invest in its characters and cheer for their every success. By the climax, I was howling with laughter and reassessing my cynical opinions about my fellow man.

The "Devil" in question is J.P. Merrick (Charles Coburn), the richest man in the world. The reclusive tycoon is shocked to find himself in a photo on the front page of the newspaper being burned in effigy outside a New York department store he owns. Some of the employees there have been trying to unionize, and Merrick is not happy about the changing tide of worker's rights. He decides to go undercover and get a job working in the children's shoe department so he can witness first hand what all the fuss is about and root out the agitators.

It's there that he meets Mary Jones (Jean Arthur), a sweetheart of a salesgirl who shows the old man the ropes and even loans him half a buck when she thinks he hasn't any money for lunch. Mary is a kind woman who has been around the block a couple of times but hasn't let it tire her out. She invites Merrick into her world, helping to fix him up with one of the older employees at the store (Spring Byington) and also taking him to workers' meetings. Her boyfriend Joe (Robert Cummings) is the organizer of the would-be union, and Mary has inadvertently put him in the boss' cross-hairs. Not even a conspiracy-minded politico like Joe suspects that the enemy is walking in their midst.

Unsurprisingly, Merrick ends up taking a real liking to his new friends and their simple way of living. The Devil and Miss Jones joins the ranks of other socially conscious comedies from the 1930s and 1940s that found humor and honesty in the plight of the working man by putting the privileged few down amongst the masses. It's equal in measure to 1936's My Man Godfrey [review] and Sullivan's Travels [review], also released in 1941. In some ways, sure, it maybe simplifies the issues, particularly in how the villainous money man so easily goes from gruff grizzly to lovable teddy bear, but at the same time, The Devil and Miss Jones can be disarmingly frank, both in how it deals with work relations and also romantic entanglements. In the eyes of writer Norman Krasna (White Christmas) and director Sam Wood (Pride of the Yankees [review]), both aspects of modern living are connected. Everything we do is about how we survive in a world where it's easy to get lost in the hustle and bustle, it all comes down to how we treat one another. It's not like it is in the movies or popular songs, Mary tells us, sometimes you just have to love the one you're with.

This practical approach to life is nowhere more evident than in the sequence where Mary organizes a trip to the beach at Coney Island. There, the quartet are just a four-spot amongst hundreds of others. Merrick, who is unfamiliar with such outings, gets separated from the crew and finds himself without his clothes or identification, seeking a way to make contact. That his friends not only find him but rescue him from incarceration at the risk of their own freedom shows him what it's like for the common man living his day-to-day without the safety nets of money and power. Family and companionship are all they really have.

Charles Coburn was nominated for an Academy Award for his portrayal of the gruff businessman. His is an expert performance, never overplayed, not even when the scene calls for him to lose his temper. Sentimentality is kept to a minimum, even when he is going through his transformation. The script smartly communicates the bulk of his metamorphosis through action rather than speech. Merrick's evolution is mostly reaction.

Even so, the Devil is no match for Miss Jones. How have I not been on the Jean Arthur train before now? The actress' performance here is a revelation. She carries the picture, providing both its heart and its funnybone. There are a couple of fantastic slapstick moments in the climax, including an hysterical interior debate perfectly executed through exterior performance and gesture when Mary has to decide whether or not to strike Merrick across the back of the head with a shoe. Determination crumbles into fear and concern and then self-recrimination, all played out silently behind the elder gentleman's back. The comedy works because we already know what kind of a person Mary is, we know it's not really in her to crack her friend's skull. Jean Arthur has sold us on the bigger emotions, delivering a pair of monologues about romance and individual determination that, had they come via a less capable personality, would have just seemed schmaltzy.

That's the true indicator of how well The Devil and Miss Jones holds together. Even when it goes broad with either the comedy or the politics, the film utilizes intelligence and honesty in equal measure to what it otherwise shows in the quieter moments. The audience can get on board with the sweeping changes because Sam Wood and company have already built to them by lining up a series of tiny changes, laying a foundation so The Devil and Miss Jones can deliver on its promise of big entertainment without sacrificing any of its heart. And, boy, does it ever work! This is the kind of movie that you want to start over just as soon as it ends in the hope that you can forever sustain the feeling it's inspired. If the party is still rockin', then what's the point in stoppin'?

PRIDE OF THE YANKEES - CRITERION CHANNEL

This review originally written for DVDTalk.com in 2008.

The Pride of the Yankees is the sports biopic by which all others are measured. Made in 1942, it stars Gary Cooper as Lou Gehrig, the legendary Yankees first baseman who played in over 2,000 consecutive games across a decade and a half before being forced to retire due to ALS, a deadly illness that is now more commonly known as "Lou Gehrig's disease."

The formula should be pretty familiar to all movie buffs by now: a boy grows up in the Bronx dreaming of playing baseball, his dream comes true, he learns the ropes and becomes a star, finds love, and then the final act. It's a set-up that has stood the test of time because its universality ensures that it will always work. In the case of Gehrig, he was enough of a unique character that the now cliché style (which this movie arguably invented) is barely noticeable. A straight shooter who was ready to chuck dreams of sports stardom to pursue a practical career, he only took the Yankees' offer for a contract so he he could pay for his sick mother's hospital bills. He continued to conduct himself in the same moral manner for his entire run as a Yankee, breaking records and inspiring millions. There are some famous anecdotes portrayed, such as hitting two homeruns for a boy in the hospital, and the romance between Lou and his wife Eleanor (Teresa Wright) is given center stage in the second act. The third act is taken up with Gehrig's illness, a climax with enormous pathos. When the disease starts to wreck havoc on Lou's body, you're going to realize how much you've come to care for the big lug.

Some elements of Pride of the Yankees haven't aged as well as others. The concoction of two warring reporters (Walter Brennan and Dan Duryea) who spend the years arguing about Lou's potential is kind of corny, and there are times when I found Cooper's "aw shucks" demeanor a little forced. These are minor bumps in the road, however, and easy to get past.

Pride of the Yankees really starts to get going when Teresa Wright enters the scene. The actress was to have her finest hour a year later in Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt, but she's an alluring presence in this film, bringing oodles of charm to the screen. The courtship of Lou and Eleanor is sweetened with a smartly pitched comic streak, and the relationship only becomes more delightful as the years progress and they become partners in the truest sense.

Director Sam Wood (Kitty Foyle) also knows when to dole out a good baseball scene or two. The best is the aforementioned World Series game where both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig had to come through for the sick child. Also quite good are the games where Lou is starting to realize something is wrong. In fact, it's a little backwards that the director is more adept at the struggle than he is the victory. Authenticity is added by the fact that Babe Ruth and many of Gehrig's other teammates played themselves in the picture.

Of course, Pride of the Yankees would be nothing without the last scene, the recreation of Gehrig's farewell speech to a stadium full of fans. Here is where Cooper's common-man restraint really pays off. He doesn't oversell it, doesn't try to stray outside of the humble parameters Gehrig set for him at the real event. It's a stirring moment, and one of the most memorable in movie history. The final shots of the player walking off the field are poignant and beautiful. There was nowhere to go from there, best to just fade to black.