Page Miss Glory (1935)

the audience applauded

Good start, but then it gets ruined

Awesome Movie

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Considering the talent invested in this movie, and the fast paced, well developed story, this should have been a near classic. The story of two glib con men, who first invent a contest winner by photographic trickery, then find a maid who fits the description, is done well enough that you can buy the premise. Here are two problems: Pat O'Brien, who plays one of the con men, does what he always does in this type of role - talks with a machine gun like speed, making it all but impossible to understand him. Secondly, Marion Davies, the maid who is talked into portraying "Miss Dawn Glory", the contest winner, simply can't act. Granted, she was extremely attractive, bright, and possessed a presence all but impossible to ignore. But I have never seen any evidence that she had much talent for acting. The rest of the cast were close to being perfect for their roles, most notably Patsy Kelly and Dick Powell.

After William Randolph Hearst took his Cosmopolitan Pictures off the MGM lot and onto Warner Brothers, Marion Davies for her first film was given the title role in Page Miss Glory. The film is based on a Broadway play that ran only 63 performances during the 1934-1935 season.Press Agents Pat O'Brien and Frank McHugh concoct a phony beauty by taking facial features from several known movie stars to create the perfect American beauty. When asked to produce her, our intrepid duo is stuck, but when hotel chambermaid Marion Davies comes in to make up the room, it seems like a prayer has been answered.O'Brien and McHugh are playing roles that they've both done dozens of times alone and together at Warner Brothers in the Thirties. I think Pat O'Brien pulled more cinematic cons than any other player on record. Davies has some very funny moments and I know she wished she could have done more films like this one.Dick Powell plays a Charles Lindbergh like aviator with a nice tenor voice who sings the song Harry Warren and Al Dubin wrote for the film Page Miss Glory. It's done during a dream sequence when Davies still thinking like a chambermaid, imagines herself being swept up romantically by Powell.Page Miss Glory is one of Marion Davies better sound features and still worth seeing today.

"PAGE MISS GLORY" A pleasant surprise viewing, we stumbled over this movie this morning on TCM (Turner Classic Movies). Our Satellite Service (DISH) provided its very brief introduction; noting that Marion Davies was in the Cast, we stayed on and viewed the entire show.I was raised in a family that did not admire Marion Davies nor, for that matter, W.R. (William Randolph Hearst). In fact, our family took its orders from the Legion of Decency listings; watching a condemned film could book you a ticket to H*E*L*L. Thus, I was amply supplied with bias and prejudice against the STAR of this movie. SURPRISE! Hey, I think she is acting! Just this week, I had read about the Production Code that governed what we the public could see - for example, the principals in a bedroom scene needed to keep at least one foot on the floor at all times. The article discussed the effect of the code upon how women were to be portrayed - before 1934, when the Code went into effect, women could be "sultry", "naughty", or whatever. After, however, the woman had to be relegated to unimportant and uninspiring roles; a rule, per the article, that led to popular male roles and the rise of male stars.MARION DAVIES was relatively unknown to me for the aforesaid reasons - for once, my "Videohound" was mute on the movie but did show that she had two other movies released on Video.So, we watched. We were seeing a CODE movie. A Cinderella story, she played an overly dumb blonde hotel room maid who (unwittingly)influenced a couple of promoters' efforts to create a pinup of the "the perfect" candidate for a beauty contest. The pinup is a composite of attractive parts of attractive women. Guess who looked like the imaginary pinup? We enjoyed the movie from start to finish and got a lot of good laughs - you would enjoy it. The only problem I had was the role played by Mary Astor - perhaps her sympathetic support lent stature to the movie but Astor's female role acted depressed and confused - not too dangerous to the men's silly schemes.I was sure that W.R. had meddled with the whole thing until I looked up "Page Miss Glory" in IMDb. From there, came most of the facts quoted above. It turns out that Davies' accomplishments included Movie Scripts and she produced a dozen movies. In all she acted in 48 movies from 1917 to 1937. Since "Page Miss Glory" was her 45th, it is a mature effort.

Like "Front Page Woman," this is a comedy I'd never heard of and only discovered because of TCM. Fast paced dialogue played with relentless Looney Tunes energy make this a sharp spoof of media manipulation and public gullibility that holds up well nearly 70 years later. Marion Davies inhabits her slow witted small town girl thrust into the limelight. Dick Powell parodies himself as the Hero of the Air who falls in love with her picture and proposes before they've ever met. Pat O'Brien and Frank McHugh share a wonderful rapport as the con artists behind it all. Only Mary Astor seems wasted as she has little to do though she does it with elan. Treads similar territory to `Nothing Sacred' or more recent offerings like `Simone' and `Wag the Dog.' Highly recommended.