... although I enjoy to some degree just about everything William Powell was ever in. He saves this from being a 4 or 5 star movie for me. Edna Best was a well respected actress of the stage, but she just did not impress on screen. The story is about a British intelligence officer (Colin Clive) and his wife (Edna Best) who is stuck on some old boyfriend (William Powell as another British officer and stuckee). To complicate matters, Powell and Clive are best friends from before either of them knew Edna, and now Clive and Edna are billeted in the apartment just below Powell.
The setting is weird for a Depression era Warner's film. In terrain usually traversed by Paramount or MGM, here is WB in the middle of a period piece romance/drama involving the Irish rebellion and the sinn fein.
The art design and attention to detail is very good here, with the actors even having the - by American standards - rather weird British means of saluting down pat. Michael Curtiz' direction is impressive, and he tries to make the film more interesting with some of his famous genius with the camera, but he just can't save this script or Best's shrill performance or lack of chemistry with either one of the leading men. I would expect the leading men to be more likely to chuck it all and go off together than to have either one of them win Best's final affection or want it in the first place.
Maybe the irony in all of this is that "The Key" was William Powell's final film at Warner Brothers, who was not that happy with the roles he was getting there. And what is the first film he does after arriving at MGM? The equally sappy "Manhattan Melodrama" in which we are expected to believe that Mickey Rooney grows up to be Clark Gable! Oh well, after this rough patch there are much better things ahead in film for William Powell.
The setting is weird for a Depression era Warner's film. In terrain usually traversed by Paramount or MGM, here is WB in the middle of a period piece romance/drama involving the Irish rebellion and the sinn fein.
The art design and attention to detail is very good here, with the actors even having the - by American standards - rather weird British means of saluting down pat. Michael Curtiz' direction is impressive, and he tries to make the film more interesting with some of his famous genius with the camera, but he just can't save this script or Best's shrill performance or lack of chemistry with either one of the leading men. I would expect the leading men to be more likely to chuck it all and go off together than to have either one of them win Best's final affection or want it in the first place.
Maybe the irony in all of this is that "The Key" was William Powell's final film at Warner Brothers, who was not that happy with the roles he was getting there. And what is the first film he does after arriving at MGM? The equally sappy "Manhattan Melodrama" in which we are expected to believe that Mickey Rooney grows up to be Clark Gable! Oh well, after this rough patch there are much better things ahead in film for William Powell.