IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934) **1/2 Takes place over several nights, actually, but that's neither the problem nor the charm. Robert Riskin gives Clark Gable a suitcase full of fine lines, and Gable delivers them as his own. Which, considering how much he's drinking (in the film and off set), may well be the case. The only problems, if you consider them such, are that it's all more or less in a cardboard cutout of a plot, and, with the exception of Walter Connolly in his latter scenes, none of the leads really belong on screen with Clark. It isn't Claudette Colbert's fault that she inspired the multitudes to reprise her "poor little rich girl" character, frequently better, on screen and in real life. Nor is it entirely implausible that he would fall for her, stranger things have happened-again, on screen and in real life. It's just that each of these dramas is interesting to a varying degree, and whichever ones have her in it aren't particularly high on my fascination scale. It's too bad that Myrna Loy turned down the role. Frank Capra already knew how to shoot the rural encampments of America, but his contempt for the haughty and affluent would become more effective in later films as it became more gentle. That being said, he and Riskin clearly demonstrate an understanding that could be interpreted as affection of some diluted sort. The reality, though, is that without Gable you've got a pretty dull film, and with him you have one that's funny enough to keep your attention. He's very sharp, very witty, unreservedly debonair in a ramshackle sort of way; it's a more overtly brilliant performance than Gone With the Wind. I also like the Alan Hale character, he anticipates Saturday Night Live (very high praise in my book), and doesn't narc on Clark.
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