Tonight's Movie: Hard to Get (1938)

HARD TO GET is a pleasant though not particularly distinguished screwball romance about a silly heiress (Olivia de Havilland) and a gas station attendant (Dick Powell). The film is most notable for Powell's introduction of the Warren-Mercer standard "You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby," crooned to de Havilland while they are boating.

Wealthy Margaret Richards (de Havilland) drives off from home in a huff and finds herself with an empty gas tank and no purse. She has the tank filled at a motor court gas station, asking attendant Bill Davis to charge the gas to her father's address. Bill thinks Margaret's a deadbeat and, to her outrage, he makes her clean the 10 motor court rooms to pay for the gas she had put in her car.

Margaret decides to return the next day and pretend to apologize to Bill, thinking she'll get to know him and find a way to get back at him. They go to dinner, and Bill ends up thinking she's the maid at her family's mansion...and Margaret realizes Bill's really a nice guy...and on it goes in fairly typical romantic comedy style.

A large section of the plot focuses on Bill's attempt to sell his plans for a national chain of gas stations and motor courts to Margaret's father (Charles Winninger) and her father's friend (Thurston Hall). This angle goes on way too long and detracts from the developing romance, which plays second fiddle to Bill's business dreams.

I was also rather surprised that Bonita Granville and Isabel Jeans, who play de Havilland's sister and mother, disappear after the opening sequence and don't return until the movie's final scene. Granville is billed fifth, yet she's on screen far less time than actors billed much lower in the credits. I wish the movie had focused more on Powell, de Havilland, and the rest of her family. A dinner party scene where de Havilland trades places with the real maid (Penny Singleton) is amusing; more scenes like that would have been welcome.

On the other hand, did we really need to watch Charles Winninger and Melville Cooper unbelievably ride a beam up 40 stories high at a construction site to meet with Bill on business? The construction site scene alone sucked up a lot of time, without much purpose as far as driving the plot forward. That part of the story could have been told much more concisely. I think Winninger and Cooper had as much screen time together as Powell and de Havilland!

"You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby" is one of a number of Harry Warren standards introduced by Dick Powell in the '30s. Other Warren titles which originated in Powell films include "I'll String Along With You" from TWENTY MILLION SWEETHEARTS (1934), "I Only Have Eyes For You" from DAMES (1934), and "I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm" from ON THE AVENUE (1937).

The supporting cast also includes Grady Sutton, Allen Jenkins, John Ridgely, and Nella Walker, who's turned up in a couple other films I've watched in the last few days.

HARD TO GET was directed by Ray Enright. It runs 82 minutes.

This movie is available on DVD-R from the Warner Archive. It can also be seen on Turner Classic Movies.

The trailer is here.