Not a great movie, with a predictable storyline and some star-quality-free performances from Grant Withers and the never-interesting Regis Toomey as best-buddy rail men, but a nicely paced look at the early Depression, with some very location-looking photography: The rail yards and rural locations look to be well beyond the Warners back lot. Joan Blondell, in a very real-looking coffee shop, is a hoot as a waitress who claims she's "APO -- ain't puttin' out," and Mary Astor, as Toomey's wife who gets something going with Withers, was never less than absolutely honest and convincing. There's also early Cagney, light on his feet and sassy, and some documentary-looking train footage. One has to question the morality of the piece -- Astor and Withers essentially murder Toomey, and get off scot-free -- and thus the happy ending doesn't feel as happy as it should. But William Wellman paces it nicely, and its portrait of a long-vanished Midwest is tangy.
Review of Other Men's Women
