Une perle rare

In her third talkie, Bebe Daniels stars here as Gertie Jones, a thief who poses as a French maid to rob old ladies of their jewels. In the middle of a job, she is interrupted by a safecracker, Ben Lyon. When the pair is caught by the police, Lyon gallantly takes the rap and serves a year in prison. They fall in love.

Once out of prison, Daniels pushes for the couple to go straight. They meet a nice elderly couple and the man takes Lyon as a business partner for a $30,000 investment. They revel in "the straight life" until fate take an ironic turn.

Daniels and Lyon, both major silent stars, are quite good in this 1930 talkie. The chemistry between them is obvious; indeed, they married soon after making this film. While the plot is rather creaky, the stars inject tons of personality and make this watchable.

Robert Emmett O'Connor plays Kelsey the cop, Nella Walker and Maude Turner Gordon play rich victims, Arthur Housman plays a crook, Ray Cooke plays the wise-cracking office boy, Betty Pierce plays the sad-sack Nellie, and John Ince and Daisy Belmore play the kindly older couple.

Bebe Daniels and Ben Lyon would make a few more films together in the US and UK before turning to radio in the early 40s. Their "Hi, Gang!" series was a hit and was made into a 1941 feature film. From there they starred in "Life with the Lyons" on radio, TV, and 2 feature films with their children, Barbara and Richard.