Smart Blonde (1937)

Best movie of this year hands down!

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

After watching the profoundly mediocre Torchy Blane in Chinatown I decided that I wouldn't bother watching any more movies in the Torchy series. But when I saw this on TCM, I thought, well, it's the first movie in the series so perhaps it's a bit better. After all, it inspired a series.Maybe it is better - I didn't watch enough of it to be sure - but it's certainly not very good. There is a clunky amateurishness about the film and its performers that puts it below a big percentage of B movies. It's more of a C movie.Still, if I hadn't already had a poor impression of Torchy I might have given the film more than 20 minutes. Maybe it gets better after that.

This is the first of nine Torchy Blane films. Glenda Farrell plays Torchy and Barton MacLane plays her fiancé, the police lieutenant. In an almost unrecognizable supporting role, you have a young Jane Wyman--look carefully, it really is her. This is ironic, as in the last Torchy Blane film (TORCHY BLANE...PLAYING WITH DYNAMITE), Wyman herself played the role of Blane. In total, Farrell played the lead in seven of the nine films--with Lola Lane playing Torchy in one of the films in the middle of the series.The film begins with Torchy rushing to meet a train so she can interview Tim Torgensen who just agreed to buy the business empire of Fitz Mularkey. However, just after they leave the train, Torgensen is shot and killed. Who did it is uncertain, but it happens right before Torchy's eyes. Naturally she calls her newspaper with the story, but in a pattern to be repeated in future films of the series, she helps her fiancé investigate the crime.Look quickly at the railway station. That's Wayne Morris behind the desk doing a tiny bit part just before he became a Warner Brothers star.Overall, the film is very typical of B-detective films of the era. While not nearly as interesting as the Charlie Chan or Saint films, it's pretty good for fans of the genre. For others, it's a pleasant little time-passer.

This is an enjoyable little comedy/mystery in the Torchy Blane series that starred GLENDA FARRELL and BARTON MacLAINE on the trail of a killer involved in a nightclub mystery.Farrell is a fast-talking newspaper reporter smitten by her policeman boyfriend MacLaine. The breezy byplay between the reporter gal and her boyfriend is snappy enough to keep the plot moving briskly towards a solution of the murder. JANE WYMAN pops up as a flighty hatcheck girl who has almost no bearing on the plot.Interesting to spot ROBERT PAIGE in an early role before Universal groomed him for a bid toward stardom opposite stars like Deanna Durbin (in "Can't Help Singing").Passes the time but strictly a programmer.

The movie doesn't work that well as a mystery, so I think the viewer should just think of it as a romantic comedy since MacLane and Farrell succeed so brilliantly at elevating the material and they have such good on screen chemistry.Also, considering that while Torchy has real affection for MacBride, she doesn't hesitate to let him know when she thinks he's being ridiculous (Dixie to Torchy "Ain't he masterful?" Torchy "Yeah, all he needs is a leopard skin!")and he's not the center of her life.She was years ahead of her time so I think she was a good role model.Maybe Torchy is what Nancy Drew would be if she ever written as an adult.