Platinum Blonde (1931)

You won't be disappointed!

Undescribable Perfection

Admirable film.

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Rom-com, 1931 style. Robert Williams plays a newspaper reporter who falls for a rich socialite (Jean Harlow) and the two get married, against her mother's objections. The relationship is ill-matched, him resenting being treated as a 'bird in a gilded cage', as he and others put it, and she disliking his crude ways and partying friends. Meanwhile, the gal pal played by Loretta Young carries a torch for him all along. You know how it's going to end, but it's charming nevertheless, has a script full of funny touches, and is well cast all around. Williams is smooth and wonderful, and reminds one of Spencer Tracey. Characteristic to the time, he settles a few disagreements with his fists, but it's as good-natured a way as Capra can make it. He also a couple of very nice romantic scenes with Harlow – the first, talking and then kissing behind the window of a beautiful garden waterfall, and the second, playfully making up and singing a song debating whether he should wear garters or not. It's absolutely tragic that Williams would die at the age of 37 three days after the film's premier, and that Harlow would die six years later at the age of 26.

I see that I'm in good company here on IMDb in first wondering why on earth I had never heard of Robert Williams before and then in regretting that his career was cut so short after hearing his story.Williams proves himself to be a winning and engaging comedian in this very funny Frank Capra film about a reporter (Williams) who marries a society dame (Jean Harlow) only to realize that his true love is for the female co-worker (Loretta Young) who's been by his side the whole time. Never mind that Young is one hundred times more feminine and prettier than Harlow -- I just chalk it up to the theory that Harlow had a certain look that was very much in vogue in the 1930s and that made her extremely attractive to people.I don't think Harlow is at all attractive, but I do see her appeal, and I didn't find her performance to be as bad in this film as the history books have claimed. It's true that the casting should have been reversed, and Young should have played the society belle with Harlow as the working-class girl next door. But never mind. She equips herself pretty well with the material given her, and she manages to be believable in the role.But in any case, it's neither of the women you'll remember from this movie. It's Williams and his absolutely fantastic way with a funny line. He died of appendicitis at the age of 37, and it's clear that 30s movie audiences lost a potentially major star when they lost him.Grade: A-

Let me just say, flat out, this film was simply...The Robert Williams show. It's an absolute tragedy we never got to see anymore films with him in it. I'd bet he would have been a star.It's easy to see why he was chosen for the lead in this one. This guy had serious screen charisma. For a film made in 1931 it sure feels like one from today. You get the impression he was almost like William Powell in his delivery. He's dead on in every scene. It doesn't hurt that Capra Directed this one so you know it wouldn't be a stinker.You would think with Jean Harlow in this it would be another one of her wise crackin' ways films...but it's not. I mean it's obvious the film played on her with the title but this was before she became the Jean Harlow we all know from The Red-Headed Woman to Red Dust and all the way to her early death. She's sorta second string in this one. For what it's worth, she couldn't hold a candle to her counterpart in this film in Loretta Young, in terms of beauty. Jean Harlow may have been probably the earliest screen vamp but she wasn't near as beautiful as a lot of her contemporaries.Don't see this film because it's got Jean Harlow and don't see it because it's an early Capra work. See it for Robert Williams...the would have been major star. For what it's worth, Robert Williams should be proud wherever he is, he made a winner.

This is my favorite Capra film. It lacks the complexity and serious moments that make his later films more memorable, but the simplicity and beauty of the staging and editing and the playfulness of every scene.Jean Harlow is the archetype of blond movie sirens and she is just fine here, one can see why the lead character, reporter Stu falls in love with her instantly. She is a good enough actress that one sees why he would not necessarily find happiness with her.Loretta Young is the real discovery here for me. She is so sweet as the non-sexual Gallagher, that she steals the movie from Harlow.I wanted to mention Walter Catlett as Binji. He is hilarious in the four or five short scenes that he is in.Every one says that Robert Williams is great as the lead and he is. However, it is clearly Capra's direction that is responsible. He also got great performances out of Gary Cooper and James Stewart in his later classics.Interesting foreshadowing of some of the class conflict issues that Riskin and Capra would tackle later. Here the disdain for the ruling class is quite clear. It isn't as fuzzy as it would become in later movies.