Central Park (1932)

A lot of fun.

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

A Warners B that crams a lot into just under an hour, and belongs to no genre. It's a comedy! It's a tragedy! It's a drama! It's Warner Brothers social consciousness! Joan Blondell and Wallace Ford, both unemployed and living in the titular park, meet, flirt, and get into adventures, mostly involving her being hired by thugs posing as cops to help throw a charity event at the Central Park Casino. Meanwhile, in the Central Park Zoo, a keeper is abusing a lion, and is about to be confronted by a former colleague, who has escaped from the loony bin. So we've got gangsters, Depression romance, a sympathetic cop going blind (Guy Kibbee, plunging deeper than usual), and a lion loose in the park. It's fast and lively, far livelier than the usual output of John Adolfi, who tended to drag scenes out. It may have been filmed in Burbank, but the combination of stock footage and studio footage is expertly assembled, and the mad-lion sequences are satisfyingly frightening--I wouldn't be surprised to learn that extras were harmed during the making. Blondell is in her beguiling sexy-sassy mode, and Ford may not have been her strongest lead ever, but he gives good Forgotten Man.

Generally, Warner Brothers made terrific films--lots of fun and with some wonderful actors. However, this B-movie just never seemed to gel for me--mostly because the script was so bizarre and uneven. Even with Joan Blondell, Wallace Ford and Guy Kibbee trying their best, it's still a sub-par film.The film is unusual for a Depression-era movie in that it actually acknowledges that their is a depression!! Too often, films throughout the 1930s were about rich society folks--yet most people in the country were barely scraping by. Here, the film finds Ford and Blondell homeless and without jobs. They manage to scrape by here and there but have to sleep in the park because they just haven't got enough money even to eat. Later, their need for a job manages to merge with another plot--this one involving a cop with bad eyesight (Kibbee) and an escaped maniac. Both plots (particularly the Kibbee one) are just weird and tough to connect with. How they later intersect is also odd. Now I like novel ideas--but they need to be realistic or at least enjoyable. However, I just kept waiting and waiting for some payoff but by the end of the film I just came to realize that this was a bit of a bust. Not terrible--but also not particularly good. Considering that Blondell was a very new starring actress, this sort of throwaway role isn't all that surprising. Most actors did a few turkeys like this on their role to stardom.

In New York's Central Park, jobless Joan Blondell (as Dot) flirts with unemployed Wallace Ford (as Rick) as they ogle unaffordable hot dogs. When a wayward baseball strikes the vendor's window, Ms. Blondell swipes two juicy hot dogs, which she shares with Mr. Ford. The two are mutually attracted, and arrange a more proper date. Ford is acquainted with the park cop Guy Kibbee (as Charlie). Mr. Kibbee has one week of work until he is eligible for pensioned retirement. However, Kibbee is no longer a competent policeman - his vision is failing...Blondell is duped, by gangsters, into working undercover in a "Most Beautiful Girl" contest. Ford smells trouble, and gets into danger of his own. Meanwhile, lunatic John Wray (as Smiley) escapes from his insane asylum. A former keeper at the "Central Park Zoo", Mr. Wray causes trouble for everyone by causing the zoo's killer lion ("Nebo") to escape from his cage, and threaten the environs. Henry B. Walthall (as Eby) is a Kibbee confidante. Harold Huber (as Nick) is the gang leader. Director John G. Adolfi and his cast make this creaky early talkie roar with all their might.****** Central Park (12/10/32) John G. Adolfi ~ Joan Blondell, Wallace Ford, Guy Kibbee, Henry B. Walthall

Set entirely in Central Park (albiet a studio bound, rear projection version of it), this is one of Warner's most fascinating 60-minute lightning rounds, with Joan Blondell as the out of work Roxy usherette who gets caught up with gangsters (in her first scene she steals a hot dog from a vendor, out of starvation). On hand are Wallace Ford as the "Forgotten Man" who falls for her, Guy Kibbee as a Central Park cop, and John Wray as a sociopath on the loose.If that isn't enough plot for an hour, there's a lion that escapes from the Central Park Zoo, and I don't know if it's special effects or just brilliant editing, but I'd swear that the extras and stunt men where REALLY put in harm's way with this animal, especially in the horrifying scene in the cage.I have to address another reviewer's question about the "appeal of Joan Blondell." I totally disagree. Blondell's pre-code output is worthy of its own book. She was a master of rapid fire dialogue and wisecracks, with excellent comic timing. She instilled energy into films that are now unimaginable without her (GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933, NIGHT NURSE, BIG CITY BLUES, DAMES, etc), and if nothing else was the best co-star James Cagney ever had (BLONDE CRAZY, FOOTLIGHT PARADE, HE WAS HER MAN). I'd vote that her performances survive intact, and haven't dated a bit in 75 years (which I cant say for Garbo, Shearer, Crawford and some other shining lights of the era).