Love in the blink of an eye
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Love in the blink of an eye |
| Original title | Hands across the table |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1935 |
| length | 80 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Mitchell Leisen |
| script |
Viña Delmar , Norman Krasna |
| production | E. Lloyd Sheldon |
| music |
Sam Coslow , Friedrich Hollaender |
| camera | Ted Tetzlaff |
| cut | William Shea |
| occupation | |
| |
Love in no time ( Hands Across the Table ) is a screwball comedy with Carole Lombard and Fred MacMurray , directed by Mitchell Leisen .
action
Regi Allen is a New York manicurist determined to escape poverty and misery through her marriage to a rich man. During one of her jobs she meets the heir to the Savoy Carlton Hotel, Allen Macklyn. The former sports pilot has been dependent on a wheelchair since an accident. Everyone falls in love with the young woman, but does not confess his love to her because he fears the answer. A short time later, Regi made the acquaintance of Theodore Drew III, the heir of a formerly wealthy family who, however, lost all their belongings in the 1929 stock market crash. Theodore earns his living as a gigolo, and the two fortune hunters spend a boozy evening when Regi learns of Theodore's engagement to Vivan Snowden, a wealthy heiress of the "pineapple king" Mister Snowden.
The two fall in love anyway, probably also because they don't have to fool each other. All sorts of entanglements take their course when Ted misses his boat to Bermuda, where he was supposed to spend a fun weekend so as not to disturb Astrid in the preparations for the wedding. Ted and Regi are now trying everything in their power to create the impression that Ted is really in Bermuda and is enjoying himself there.
The whole story of lies is exposed, and Vivian breaks the engagement. However, she wants to tell Regi her opinion beforehand and goes to the Savoy-Carlton Hotel for a manicure. On the occasion she also makes the acquaintance of everyone who can now walk again. After many entanglements, Ted and Regi confess their love, while Vivian and Allen also discover their feelings for each other. The film ends with Regi and Ted driving around town on the bus. They flip a coin to decide whether to go for lunch first or to get married first. The coin jumps off the bus, Regi and Ted set up a wild chase, and in the end the coin lands on the edge and stays upright.
background
Hands Across the Table marked the turning point in the careers of Carole Lombard and Mitchell Leisen at Paramount Pictures . Lombard had so far worked in every conceivable genre without making a breakthrough to star. It was only when she appeared alongside John Barrymore in Howard Hawk's adaptation of the stage hit 20th Century that she showed her talent for comedy. Her home studio, which after the bankruptcy in 1933 had been given a new head of studio with Ernst Lubitsch as head of production, gave Lombard confidence by giving her, for the first time, Hands Across the Table, a film that was tailored to her talent and personality . Her partner was initially to be Cary Grant , but in the end everyone involved agreed on Fred MacMurray , who had been a popular performer of romantic comedies since appearing alongside Claudette Colbert in The Gilded Lily .
At the same time, the film was the directorial debut of Mitchell Leisen , to whom Lubitsch gave the responsibility for the implementation. In contrast to most other film studios, at Paramount it was possible to rise from screenwriter to director, as the examples of Billy Wilder and Preston Sturges show. Leisen got along very well with his star, and both were soon linked by a deep personal friendship. Hands Across the Table has unusually dark motifs for a comedy and presents two people as heroes of the story who put money over feelings and are willing to do anything to improve their economic situation.
Lombard went to great lengths to help the inexperienced MacMurray with his scenes. Leisen later recalled the filming:
-
[Carole Lombard] had none of what you might call 'the star temperament'. She felt that all the others had to be good or it wouldn't matter how good she was. She got right in there and pitched.
- She didn't have what is known as a starting temperament. She knew that everyone else in the team had to be good too, or her own efforts would be in vain. She knew that and took it to heart.
The two actors were to be in front of the camera again shortly afterwards in A Princess for America .
criticism
The film critic Otis Ferguson wrote for The New Republic magazine
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[...] the trouble and the danger with light comedy as a rule is that it is self-conscious over its lack of weight and either leaves reality altogether in an attempt to be capricious and unexpected about everything, or fastens on each excuse for feeling with a hollow and forced semblance of deep emotion. That Hands Across the Table keeps the delicate and hard balance between these two courses of procedure is partly the work of direction, cutting, dialogue writing; but considerably the work of Carole Lombard and Fred MacMurray.
- The problem and the danger with light comedy lies in the lack of substantive weight and either the creators try to completely ignore reality in their attempt to appear capricious and surprising, or they apologize for every attempt to feel serious demonstrate. Hands Across the Table creates the difficult balance between these extremes and that is not least thanks to the direction, editing and script, but mainly that of Carole Lombard and Fred MacMurray .
Mitchell Leisen's debut film, which already shows the elegant handwriting and its lightness. An amusing comedy in which situation comedy, puns and thought-provoking moments are balanced.