His Private Secretary

This would be worth watching if for no other reason than to watch John Wayne in a romantic comedy, and it's a decent movie in its own right. While its not as funny or as moving as the best films of this type, the story is good and is usually at least mildly amusing.

Wayne plays the carefree son of a rich man. His Father disapproves of him and his lifestyle, and after giving him one last chance, rejects him and the woman he has married (Evalyn Knapp). His wife decides to take matters into her own hands, with a creative scheme intended to bring the cold-hearted father to his senses. It's a fairly interesting scenario, and most of the possibilities are realized. The acting is generally good, and Wayne does well in a role much different from those he would later become famous for.

Wayne's fans should enjoy seeing how he performs in this atypical role, and fans of old-fashioned romantic comedies should also find this worth a look.

This is one of those movies that a person is going to have to make several allowances for in order to enjoy it. First, this movie was very short (60 minutes). Along with that, it seems to be filmed in segments and doesn't flow smoothly from one to the other. Quite choppy. Now, part of the reason for both of these aspects is probably to contain costs. And I fully understand that in lieu of the fact that this movie was produced during the Great Depression. However, these factors really stood out and gave the entire film a rather cheap feeling to it. Fortunately, there are a couple of good things going for this movie too. For one, it has John Wayne ("Richard Wallace") as the leading actor. Granted this is one of his earliest films and he doesn't quite have the screen presence he commanded in his later years. But that's only to be expected. Another good thing was the performance of Evalyn Knapp (as "Marion Hall"). She was really special. Be that as it may, these two ingredients couldn't quite overcome the weaknesses I mentioned earlier. As such, while the movie is definitely cute, I have to give it an average rating.

During a time when John Wayne was doing some B westerns and appearing in a few other films for Warner Brothers, he was apparently lent out to an independent outfit called Showmen's Pictures where he was the male lead in a comedy called His Private Secretary.

I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised with this one. Granted that the film doesn't exactly have the production values that one would have associated with the major studios and it can't get a better rating from me because of that. Still the performances were not bad and the Duke did a fine job in this one.

John Wayne plays the young playboy son of banker Reginald Barlow and all he has on his mind is chasing women. He's the despair of dear old dad who would like the Duke to just settle down in the family business. When he agrees to come to work, his first assignment is to get some deadbeat to cough up his loan money or foreclose.

Remember this is the Great Depression and a lot of people were in similar circumstances. But in this case the deadbeat is minister Alec B. Francis who has a pretty granddaughter Evelyn Knapp and with the Duke it's always pleasure before business.

Because Knapp doesn't immediately fall for his line and shows a serious side he's not seen in many women, Wayne is really taken with her. I think I need not say more because if you've seen thirties type comedies you know where this is heading.

The interesting thing to speculate is if this film had been the product of one of the major studios and had been given production values and a distribution level commiserate with same, what kind of turn John Wayne's career might have taken.

Though the quality of the film is not too great (hey, it IS from 1933!), it is a good little movie, and the entertainment value exceeds the quality (at least in the version we watched).

It is fun to see John Wayne in this atypical role. He plays the part of a fun-loving rich playboy, whose father wants him to settle down and start working in the family business. When he does the ultimate in settling down, by getting married, his father is convinced the wife is a gold-digger. How she convinces him otherwise is clever and well done, and shows the value of being a positive person with initiative.

MOST of the other comments on this movie say it so well, but I wanted to add one more very positive comment for the film.

If you are a John Wayne fan, you should definitely watch this movie.

It's strange to see a youthful John Wayne receiving a ticking off from his curmudgeonly father for staying out late and gallivanting with inappropriate girls. Even the Duke seems a little ill at ease and it's easy to see why he ultimately spent so much time in the saddle in the first ten years of his movie career. He just looked right up there somehow, while dressed in a suit he looks like a school kid at a wedding.

He plays Dick Wallace, the playboy son of a hard-hearted industrialist in this cheap programmer, who finds it impossible to keep his mind off women. Dad sets him to work in the office, but Big John spends his time breaking pencils so that he can ogle the legs of the secretary who re-sharpens them for him (which isn't quite the same as putting lead in it I suppose…).

Sent to a tiny village to collect a debt he tricks wholesome Evelyn Knapp into accepting a ride from him. Of course it turns out that she is the granddaughter of the man who owes Dick's dad all that money. Granddad's the village vicar, a kindly old chap who wears a hearing aid the size of an ear-muff, and he gave away all the money to the poor. Keen to get back into Evelyn's good books, Dick waives the debt, getting himself sacked in the process. Then he goes and blows it with Evelyn by trying to snog her before she's ready.

Evelyn Knapp's a pretty little creature with a winning smile and saucy hips, and it wouldn't bother me one little bit if I lost my job over her. Dick certainly isn't bothered – he just swaps his fancy car for the local garage so that he can stay close to her, even though she won't give him the time of day. Of course his dogged pursuit wears her down in the end, and within a minute of making up they're sharing rings. With that particular avenue closed to it, the film changes tack, and instead of Wayne pursuing Knapp, she now goes after his dad in order to get his blessing. Dad's convinced she's a gold-digger after Dick's inheritance, but she inadvertently winds up as his private secretary (although he doesn't know who she is) and he soon begins to thaw…

This one's obviously made on the cheap, but at least a little care has gone into the screenplay. It's supposed to be a romantic comedy but it isn't really very funny. Despite this, like John Wayne's aimless character, it is undeniably amiable, and its short running time ensures that it doesn't outlast its welcome. By the way, if you happen to watch this film, check out that stair banister in Dick's dad's house – it's got to be one of moviedom's strangest