Danger: Love at Work
                                                     
Director: Otto Preminger
Year: 1937
Rating: 5.5
This is one of those 1930's screwball comedies with a large eccentric family in which everyone is a bit off in different ways. While watching the film, it reminded me of You Can't Take It With You with a similar set-up. But that film came out in 1938 though the play it is based on was produced in 1936. So, I would expect that is not a coincidence. It is a fine cast with Jack Haley (two years before the Tin Man), Ann Sothern as the leads and Mary Boland, John Carradine, Walter Catlett, Etienne Girardot and two elderly dotty aunts (Margaret McWade, Margaret Seddon) as the family. Throw in Edward Everett Horton and Elisha Cook Jr and you certainly have the makings of a solid old-fashioned screwball comedy. So why didn't I find it all that funny? Pleasant sure, but funny? Not really. And I am not sure why. Some of the lines were amusing but it felt like they were trying too hard. It didn't feel organic but quite forced. Interesting to see Haley in the lead romantic role - I don't think he had many of those and I don't think it really suits him. Ann Sothern saves the film. She is kooky too as part of this family but she is so damn lovable that you don't mind.



They are the Pemberton family - wealthy enough to be eccentric because it doesn't seem as if anyone works. I never was able to figure how who was who in the film as its too frantic to slow down. Haley is assigned by his law firm to get their signatures on a power of attorney in order to buy a parcel of their land for $100,000. Others have tried and failed. If he fails, he will lose his job. And his valet. And his penthouse apartment. No one in the family can focus on anything and then Sothern's finance shows up to make things worse - as played by Horton. But needless to say, Haley and Sothern fall in love in about the time it takes to boil canned soup. This is directed by Otto Preminger early in his directing career. He isn't really someone I associate with fast moving, fast talking nutty comedy and I think it shows.