User Reviews

The early to mid-1930s was a bizarre time in Hollywood. Although about a quarter of the population was out of work due to the Great Depression, a long string of films about rich society people poured out of the studios. While this is a bit understandable, films like this one are a bit harder to understand. After all, the film is about a very spoiled rich brat and his hard life of partying! People watching this must have been angry at the contemptible sort of persons played by Gene Raymond and his friends in this film. They were lazy and self-centered.

The film begins with the rich playboy, Raymond, bringing home a girl (Carole Lombard) to meet his family. They are far less than thrilled, as she's a 'common woman'--not the sort of society lady they'd envisioned for their spoiled brat. However, something odd occurs after the two are married--it turns out that Lombard is simply too good for the guy! His entire life is made up of drinking, carousing, partying and drinking...as well as drinking. She wants to settle down to a quiet married life...and his family and friends seem to do everything they can to keep Raymond weak and ineffectual. And as for Raymond, he seems to have no will of his own--and does whatever his dopey friends suggest--even if it might mean losing his wife. Will they work this out and have Carole come to respect her husband or will he remain a dissolute idiot? Tune in and see.

This is a pretty good film--mostly because although it is about rich folks, there is a nice moral lesson here about responsibility and what a marriage really is. Good acting and direction also help make this one worth seeing.

S. N. Behrman was a major 20th century playwright with many delightful hits that were also made into delightful movies (don't miss "Biography of a Bachelor Girl"). This one, though, has a story that could have been written on the back of an envelope. Rich, social-register scion Gene Raymond loves working-class cabaret singer Carole Lombard (she's dubbed), but his family's dead set against any union: The nerve of that woman. They marry anyway, and her frequent exhortations that he apply himself to something besides alcohol and gambling fall on deaf ears. He takes a job with his wealthy father's firm but soon tires of it, and fills his workdays with trips to the racetrack. They separate, the family defames her as a fortune hunter, and suddenly he grows a pair. He rebels against the clan, learns to do an honest day's work, and they're reunited. That's about it; there's also the pal who's hopelessly in love with Lombard (Arthur Hohl, who played many such parts) and the opportunistic friend who leads Raymond down the path of hedonism and excess (Monroe Owsley, who also played many such parts). David Burton's direction is, let's say, efficient, and Lombard, not quite at her career peak yet, is earnest and convincing and, of course, gorgeous. The modestly budgeted Columbia production doesn't altogether revel in the lavish lifestyles of the moneyed class, and it's over in a little over an hour. It's adequate entertainment, but it could have used a little more humor and dash. And plot.

Rodney Deane (Gene Raymond) never worked a day in his life. He lives on a monthly allowance from his father. He meets nightclub singer Abby Fane (Carole Lombard) and they fall in love. His parents disapprove of their class differences, but the couple cannot be dissuaded from marrying.

However, Rodney and his retinue are wastrels. Abby is upset that his version of marriage is so different from hers; endless partying is not her idea of a lifestyle. But every time she tries to tell Rodney of her dissatisfaction, he charms her away from the subject.

Eventually, she gives him an ultimatum. The problem is that they both married with the idea of changing their partners. Also, Rodney's best friend, Sig, is---like a devil---always tempting him with the easy life.

The main attraction of this film is Lombard. At the time of its making, she was going through a divorce from husband William Powell, making her performance even more impressive. One wonders if some of her dialogue about dissatisfaction and incompatible styles struck home for her.

It makes the film more interesting to know that its riches-to-rags story is set against the backdrop of the Depression. Audiences probably enjoyed its moral, though they liked films about the wealthy.

Surprisingly good Carole Lombard drama about a virtuous chanteuse who is eager to have her hard drinking, wastrel husband, embrace her middle class values of hard work instead of allowing himself to be supported by his stereotypically rich and stupid parents.

There is more going on here than appears on the surface and the themes

presented would be explored more fully in other plays, novels and movies.

Are Lombard's Depression Era values of meaningless hard work for pay really the key to achieving fulfillment in life?

Clearly, the job that Lombard forced Raymond to take is mind numbing and meaningless. After all,they don't really need the money. Why take that job away from somebody else who really needs it? Shouldn't Raymond find a job more suitable for his "talents" (if he has any..)

The movie shows us some of these issues but stacks the deck by making his parents so obtuse and snobbish that Lombard by contrast seems always correct. Other movies like You Can't Take It with You take an opposite tack- life is short, why waste it on empty labor unless you have to.

Anyway, Lombard looks beautiful and her performance is emotional and nakedly "out there" as the best of the 30's and 40's actors are. Raymond isn't bad - he refers to himself as a rotter and a drunkard. Today, we might say he is a potential alcoholic and his buddy Sig is his enabler. The movies production values are quite good for 30's Columbia. The movie worth catching and thought provoking

I never thought that I would see the day when a movie would make me sympathize with the spoiled rich boy over the principled working girl, but "Brief Moment" has done it.

The rich boy was Rodney Dean (Gene Raymond), he fell in love with a nightclub singer named Abby Fane (Carole Lombard). Against the wishes of his aristocratic family he wanted to marry her. It reminded me a lot of "Lady of Scandal" (1930), a little of "Pointed Heels" (1929), and a little of a few other movies in which the wealthy aristocrat wanted to marry a showgirl.

In "Brief Moment," the two lovebirds got married over the implicit protestations of Rod's family. After their marriage, they went on a world tour, soaking in the fun and frivolities that every known tourist spot had. Even when they got back home to Rod's nice apartment, complete with three servants, they continued to be party goers. By all accounts, life for the newlyweds was merry and gay, but we found out that Abby was not that pleased with her new lifestyle.

She wanted Rod to work.

Rod was being supported by his father, William Deane (Reginald Mason), on an allowance of $4000 a week (or maybe a month). It was plenty enough for the two of them to live a very comfortable lifestyle, but, I guess in Abby's mind, living off of his father wasn't manly or honorable. She wanted to be "proud" of him, and she could not quite be proud of him if he was sponging off of his father and partying with his friend Harold Sigrift (Monroe Owsley).

This is where the movie lost me. I was thinking, "Who cares whether his father gives him an allowance or he gets some made up position from his father and then gets an allowance, it's all the same."

I was with her in respects to her being tired of going from one party to another. She felt like they didn't have a real marriage. There was no home life because they were never home, and she said they only stopped home to rest up for the next event. I totally understood her there. She didn't want that life. She wanted to settle down and be a regular couple who is busy during the day then rest at night and catch up with each other then.

I didn't understand where the working aspect came in. As a working man myself I can tell you this woman is way off base. Most working people would retire right now given the means to do so. We don't work out of the love of working, it's a means to an end. If I could earn the same amount of money without lifting a finger you better believe I'd do it.

Now, I know that in Rod's case it may be more of a pride issue because he is specifically getting money from his father, as opposed to getting it from a trust or from inheritance or some other source. For that reason it seems far more dishonorable, lazy, and spoiled that he just goes about partying all day while receiving an allowance, but that's the life of rich people! Why she would want him to work really didn't add up.

All of this could've been avoided, like so many movies in the 30s, had the two just waited and gotten to know each other a little bit better before marriage. I would say that the majority of the marital problems that occurred in 30s movies was due to the fact that the two lovers got married well before they really knew the other person. Apparently, they used to fall in love quickly and marry quickly without truly knowing who the other person was. Abby did not know Rodney. She did not know that he was an endless partygoer. She did not know that he would not have a problem whatsoever living off of an allowance from his father. She could've easily found this out, especially if it was that important to her. She could've gleaned this with just a few questions, or by waiting to learn more about her potential husband, but she didn't because she was too much in love. Usually, their standard line is "nothing else matters as long as we're in love."

What a load of hooey.

Because of Abby's misguided principles about work, I had to side with the spoiled rich boy over the working class girl. I just find it bewildering that she expected her husband to work for a living when he never worked a day in his life, was not working when he met her, nor had he probably ever even mentioned the word work so long as they were together.

Sometimes I think Hollywood likes to troll working people by patronizingly telling us that working is a lot better and more honorable than being rich. "Sure, rich people have all the fun, but you working class people have more character." Just stop it.

Back to Rod (Gene Raymond). To appease his wife, who was about to walk out on him, he agreed to get a job. He went to his father's bank and asked for a job, and he got a job at the very bottom. He was doing some of the most mundane and mind numbing work you could do. He was just checking one number against another number over and over and over again. It was enough to drive anyone crazy. So, naturally, he quit. He didn't quit and get another job, he just quit and started hanging out all day long and told his wife he was working because what would she know anyway? As long as he was getting paid, which he was via his allowance. She never saw an actual paystub with hours on it. She wouldn't know if he was working or not unless she went there to see him, which just shows how silly of a notion she had. If he got a job sorting papers or he got a job like his brother Franklin (Donald Cook), who was made VP in name only, what would it matter? Or would she have a problem with him not truly earning his pay?

The movie got sillier as it was searching and searching to create conflict when a friend of Abby's named Steve (Arthur Hohl) came by her house to catch up with her. In the course of talking, she mentioned that Rod was busy working every day and she couldn't be happier. She was as happy as a clam that she was the wife of a working man. Well, Steve knew that he'd seen Rod at the track during the days and he knew he wasn't working. Now, most people, especially most men, wouldn't care one bit about that. Most guys would mind their own business and leave the matter alone because what's the big deal anyway if he's working or if he's not working so long as he's taking care of his responsibilities at home. Steve, on the other hand, loved Abby and wanted to make sure that Rod wasn't lying to her. He told Rod that he'd better tell her or that he'd tell her.

I began scratching my head in confusion. I've seen too many pre-code movies to count in which a man would be cheating on his wife or a wife cheating on her husband and no one would say a word about it. It was some unwritten society rule which prohibited people from apprising a spouse of their partner's infidelity. But, I guess they draw the line at lying about working??!!

Really!?

Help me understand.

It all wrapped up with Rod telling Abby that he wasn't working, they split up, Rod woke up, Rod got a menial job, Rod found Abby, they lived happily ever after.

What an idiotic plot.

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