"Turn Back the Clock" is an unusual film for Lee Tracy. While he nearly always played a super-fast talking sharpie in his movies, here he plays a much more ordinary sort of guy. When the film begins, Joe (Tracy) is a hard-working guy but nothing more. When he meets an old friend who has struck it rich (Otto Kruger), Joe begins to think how his life had been if he'd just made a few different decisions. After all, he could have had the life his friend now has. Soon after this, Joe is struck by a car and ends up in the hospital. During the period in which he's unconscious, he imagines that he's back 20 years and he has his married life to do all over. While he loves the girl he eventually married, he now knows that if he'd just married another girl he could have been rich--so he does so and the film shows his life he could have had. Not too surprisingly, his new life turns out to be a lot less wonderful than he'd thought--and by the end, he's much like Dorothy from "The Wizard of Oz"--thinking there's no place like home--and no wife like his old wife.
So is the picture any good? After all, it's not the usual sort of Tracy role. Well, I'd have to say that the film is only fair. While I loved the ending (Tracy's lines here were great) and the plot wasn't bad, I didn't like the way the film was occasionally written. Too often, Joe seems like a moron--and as he does things, he often does them dumbly--such as telling everyone about the future and saying things that just didn't seem very realistic (particularly on his wedding day). In fact, it's a very ordinary picture aside from one thing--the Three Stooges. Despite their spending almost their entire careers with Columbia Pictures, they (and their front man Ted Healy) were first brought to Hollywood by MGM--but the studio had no idea what to do with them. Here, instead of comedy, the trio are singers. Now they did a nice job--but it's also a very tiny part and you really need to pay attention to see Moe, Curly and Larry--especially since they do not sport their usual hairdos.
So is the picture any good? After all, it's not the usual sort of Tracy role. Well, I'd have to say that the film is only fair. While I loved the ending (Tracy's lines here were great) and the plot wasn't bad, I didn't like the way the film was occasionally written. Too often, Joe seems like a moron--and as he does things, he often does them dumbly--such as telling everyone about the future and saying things that just didn't seem very realistic (particularly on his wedding day). In fact, it's a very ordinary picture aside from one thing--the Three Stooges. Despite their spending almost their entire careers with Columbia Pictures, they (and their front man Ted Healy) were first brought to Hollywood by MGM--but the studio had no idea what to do with them. Here, instead of comedy, the trio are singers. Now they did a nice job--but it's also a very tiny part and you really need to pay attention to see Moe, Curly and Larry--especially since they do not sport their usual hairdos.