THE BRIDE COMES HOME

US, 1935, 82 minutes, Black and white.
Claudette Colbert, Robert Young, Fred Mac Murray, William Collier, Donald Meek.
Directed by Wesley Ruggles.

The Bride Comes Home is not exactly a film people would spend a lot of time discussing. However, it is one of those 1930s romantic screwball comedies which has a lot of conventional material but was quite well handled at the time and gives a good impression of the particular genre. While the film is set in the Depression and in Chicago, the focus is on the wealthy. Claudette Colbert, fresh from her Oscar winning performance in It Happened One Night, is the penniless socialite who helps the millionaire played by Robert Young in a daffy kind of way, because she needs a job. Fred Mac Murray is his bodyguard who moves to the editing of a magazine backed by Young. There are a lot of expected situations, mockery of the rich, praise of the hard workers. There are marital mix ups as Claudette finds that she has fallen in love with Fred, clashes with him and seeks refuge with Robert. There is one of those breathless climaxes as Robert and Claudette are about to get married as Fred and Claudette's father rush to the scene on a motor bike. The material is particularly American as is the style. It is the perennial material of the battle of the sexes, romance, work, careers. All discussible material but this is done in the screwball fluffy vein.