When Tomorrow Comes (1939)

Thanks for the memories!

Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Sorry, this movie sucks

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

Director: JOHN M. STAHL. Screenplay: Dwight Taylor. Based on the novel Modern Cinderella by James M. Cain. Photography: John Mescall. Film editor: Milton Carruth. Art directors: Martin Obzina, Jack Otterson. Set decorator: Russell A. Gausman. Costumes: Orry-Kelly. Music: Charles Previn, Frank Skinner. Assistant director: Joseph A. McDonough. Uncredited script contributors: Herbert J. Biberman, Aben Kandel, Charles Kaufman, John Larkin. Irene Dunne's gowns: Howard Greer. Gowns: Vera West. Music director: Charles Previn. Sound supervisor: Bernard B. Brown. Sound engineer: Joe Lapis. Producer: John M. Stahl.Copyright 16 August 1939 by Universal Pictures Co., Inc. New York opening at the Rivoli, 16 August 1939. U.S. release: 11 August 1939. Australian release: 28 September 1939. 10 reels. 92 minutes.SYNOPSIS: What Irene Dunne doesn't know is that concert pianist Boyer is married.NOTES: Academy Award, Sound Recording (beating Balalaika, GWTW, Goodbye Mr Chips, The Great Victor Herbert, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Man of Conquest, Mr Smith Goes To Washington, Of Mice and Men, The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex and The Rains Came).Re-made as Interlude in 1957, and again as Interlude in 1968.COMMENT: Lavishly produced romantic melodrama with some marvelous special effects and fascinating backgrounds that will keep male interest alive while the womenfolks weep into their lace-edged handkerchiefs. The film's main drawback is Irene Dunne. Wearing ghastly costumes and unbecomingly groomed, Miss Dunne looks about as glamorous as an old dish-mop. Fortunately, the rest of the cast is fine: Boyer charmingly elegant, and a fine study in madness from Barbara O'Neil. A lesser defect is that the script starts us off with a militant union and strike background ("Solidarity forever/For the union makes us strong!") and then darts off at a tangent for the hurricane episodes and the mad wife. These occupy most of the film and when we finally get back to the strike, it is called off in a most perfunctory and dramatically unsatisfactory fashion! John M. Stahl's direction has flair and other production credits are equally polished.

Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne star in "When Tomorrow Comes," a 1939 film directed by John Stahl and based on a story by James Cain. Cain sued for copyright infringement, stating the scene in the church was stolen from his story "Serenade" but he lost.Helen and Philip (Dunne and Boyer) meet when she waits on him in a restaurant. She learns later he's a famous concert pianist. The waitresses are planning to strike; Philip appears at the meeting and is impressed by her speech. The two make a date to meet, and he takes her out on his boat, then to his Long Island home - where they meet the famous 1938 hurricane and wind up stranded in a church. When the hurricane passes, the two must face the tumult in their lives.This is a sweet film. It does not have the scope of the Dunne/Boyer Love Affair, and the story is predictable (as was Love Affair). As they proved in their previous film, Boyer and Dunne have wonderful chemistry and warmth. Boyer must have been an interesting guy - the great screen lover who never, ever wore his toupee when he wasn't making a movie. Neither he nor the very private Dunne ever let Hollywood get the better of them.Scarlett's mother, Barbara O'Neil, has a small but showy role.Good movie.

While not as big and splashy as their pairing in "Love Affair" released the same year, Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer star in what is rather a "small" film. "When Tomorrow Comes" is a tale of unrequited love between two people who because of the man being bound to a mentally ill wife can never be together. Irene Dunne convincingly plays an underemployed ordinary working gal, one who aspires to be a singer but who is stuck toiling the days away as a waitress. Her character bonds with Boyer's character by disobeying her restaurant's "no substitutions" rule and fulfilling his request for French apple pie. This scene is endearing as she dares to simply place a piece of cheese on top of a slice of hot apple pie and cover the pie until the cheese melts--LOL, "it ain't nothing' but a thing" as Dunne goes the extra step to please the customer. From then on the two are friends and go off together to explore Manhattan and go sailing together. Their would be love affair is derailed by nothing less than a hurricane and the reappearance of Boyer's wife, played here by Barbara O'Neill. O'Neill steals the show as she portrays a woman who is mentally unbalanced, but not for the reason everyone suspects. While her illness is attributed to the death of her infant son, we soon discover that she is using this as an excuse to keep Boyer bound to her. In the scene where Dunne confronts her and pleads for her to release Boyer, we are chilled by O'Neill's psychopathic threat to do harm to Boyer should he leave her for Dunne. O'Neill is scary as hell and Dunne understands as the audience does that she is promising to do Boyer harm not merely threatening to. Because of this, Dunne knows that Boyer can never be hers and for this reason she must bid him farewell forever. The final scene where they part ways as she exits from the restaurant where they are having their last supper together is a tearjerker. No matter how many times she plays the poignant heroine who is called on to do the right thing, Dunne nails it. Her pain is our pain. Boyer's pain in losing her is also our own. Their love is lost and the pain is unbearable.

This is not one of Stahl's best works.The movie lacks a center of gravity. Melodrama interferes with social topics(unions,strikes,meetings)and even a deluge,complete with a night in a temple.Besides,the Madeleine character appears too late and is hardly credible.She suffers from mental illness since she lost her child.And the unfortunate heroine tells her so:"you win because you're helpless". Charles Boyer plays the usual Latin lover,and Irene Dunne,the impossible love ,as she did in Fannie Hurst's famous tear-jerker. The ending is ambiguous:in his 1957 remake,the by now usual Sirk remake has ,it seems -I haven't seen it yet- ,a more definitive conclusion. All in all,watchable,because of the cast ,but ,not a great Stahl.NB:I saw Sirk's remake yesterday (7/12/09).Stick with Stahl.