Charles Ruggles has a potential champion heavyweight boxer in Fred MacMurray, but he needs money, so he goes to old friend William Collier Sr. For $2000 versus a half-interest. Collier's daughter, Irene Dunne, thinks it's a ridiculous speculation, and MacMurray doesn't like spoled dames, so they quarrel. And then they get married. While MacMurray goes on the road, Miss Dunne raises their son in Collier's mansion. By the time ten years have passed and McMurray is due a late title bout, their son, Billy Cook, is alienated from him. Miss Dunne thinks that if MacMurray wanted to be a father, he had enough money five years earlier to retire and be one; instead, he has pursued his selfish goal.
Well, maybe. MacMurray does a nice bit of acting as an unself-aware mug, but Miss Dunne's strength in weepers is she's always fully aware of the risks she's taking, and goes into these misery-producing relations with her head held high. Here she knows precisely what's wrong with MacMurray, but not with her, and she seems a bit bitter and even shrewish here as she does the noble thing.
Director Wesley Ruggles has directed everyone just fine, and it's good to see Ruggles in a straight role. The brutal championship fight at the end is wince-inducing. But given that she starred in LOVE AFFAIR the same year, this one comes in a distant second.
Well, maybe. MacMurray does a nice bit of acting as an unself-aware mug, but Miss Dunne's strength in weepers is she's always fully aware of the risks she's taking, and goes into these misery-producing relations with her head held high. Here she knows precisely what's wrong with MacMurray, but not with her, and she seems a bit bitter and even shrewish here as she does the noble thing.
Director Wesley Ruggles has directed everyone just fine, and it's good to see Ruggles in a straight role. The brutal championship fight at the end is wince-inducing. But given that she starred in LOVE AFFAIR the same year, this one comes in a distant second.