HARD TO HANDLE (1933)

I watched this thinking it was gonna be all about Depression-era dance marathon contests and it was...for like 10 minutes.  Ends up James Cagney is a flimflam man who's got his nose into about every racket in town.  After his partner stiffs him in the dance marathon business, he's off to the set up a fake treasure hunt, then onto some bullshit weight loss cream and so on and so on.  Throughout it all his ups and downs his faithful dame Mary Brian still loves him.  Of course, that's not gonna stop her from running around on him with another guy.

Although HARD TO HANDLE is suppose to be a comedy I didn't find the way Cagney was constantly conning people to be funny in the least and the romance stuff was dead in the water.  The only highlight of the film was some of the Pre-Code banter was interesting in the stuff it implied, but even that doesn't make it worth going out of your way to watch it.  Okay acting, annoying mother character, unsympathetic main character, unfunny comedy.  I can't recommend it.  For hardcore classic Hollywood fans only.

GRAND HOTEL (1932)

Produced by Irving Thalberg from the novel to Broadway and eventually this film GRAND HOTEL is, to my knowledge, one of the earliest full length films that not only had an all star cast (and what a cast it is!) but also employed the storytelling technique of having multiple smaller stories centered around a central theme.  The theme here is the luxurious Grand Hotel in Berlin where, as the doctor at in the opening scene says "People come and go. Nothing ever happens."  Of course that's bullshit cause tons of stuff happens.

One of the people that come and go is Greta Garbo as a famous dancer who's career has seen better days.  She still has wealth though and part of that wealth (a pearl necklace) is the object of desire for hotel thief John Barrymore.  He gains access to the necklace, but at the same time falls in love with Garbo.  I mean who wouldn't?!  The same day industrialist Wallace Beery hires a stenographer (Joan Crawford)  who herself falls in love with John Barrymore.  At the same time Lionel Barrymore, who is a employee of Beery's, is spending his life's savings on an extravagant vacation at the Grand Hotel because he knows that he's going to die very soon.

That's just a bare outline, you should really watch it for yourself. The sets live up to the description of "grand", the story is fun and the acting is fantastic.  Required viewing for all classic Hollywood fans.

Also GRAND HOTEL holds the odd distinction of being the only film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture without it or its participants being nominated in any other category.  But then again back in 1932 the Oscars were still in their infancy and only had like 12 categories.

Double-feature with DINNER AT EIGHT.

IMDb lists Allen Jenkins as "Hotel Meat Packer (uncredited)". As best I can tell this is him.