User Reviews

"There's Always Tomorrow" is an old-fashioned story of love, romance and responsibility. Frank Morgan is the under-appreciated father of five children. Despite the fact that all but one are grown they are all referred to as children. His role in the family is doormat. Morgan's wife (Lois Wilson) is obsessed with the children and barely notices her husband. The children (Robert Taylor, Louise Latimer, Maurice Murphy, Dick Winslow and Helen Parrish) are spoiled rotten. Ella the maid (Margaret Hamilton) is the only one who pays any attention to him.

The film begins with a jubilant Morgan on his his way home from work on his wedding anniversary with a surprise for his wife--flowers, dinner and a musical show. His happiness is deflated as he walks in the door and discovers that his wife won't go because "the children" are having a party and would he please shovel coal into the furnace.

Ignored by his offspring and unable to find a place to sit down in his own house, Morgan ends up trying to read the paper on the front porch. A roadster pulls up and a beautiful woman (Binnie Barnes) climbs the step to the porch. She turns out to be a former employee of his whom he hasn't seen in years. Ms. Barnes is the star of the movie. She is graceful, elegant and has an extraordinarily expressive face.

The neglected Morgan and the glamorous Ms. Barnes rekindle an old relationship that eventually forces everyone to take a good look at themselves and try to put things right.

The world of "There's Always Tomorrow" seems older than 1934. The original novel was written by Ursula Parrott in the same year but the ambiance is Victorian. One of the delights of the film is the vehicles—huge, sleek, glossy cars and a giant streetcar. The costumes are sumptuous, mainly party clothes and some masquerade apparel. This is Robert Taylor's first appearance as a Medieval knight, a role he will play with great success later.

"There's Always Tomorrow" was Mr. Taylor's second film, after Handy Andy starring Will Rogers. The film has three acts. In act one he smiles maniacally while participating in the "children's" revels. Act two actually lets him do some acting as he is devastated by his father's seeming infidelity. In the third act he just sulks. It is hard to believe that in one year Robert Taylor will give a splendid performance in "Magnificent Obsession" and in two years hold his own with Garbo in "Camille." Taylor and Ms. Barnes worked together twice more, in "Broadway Melody of 1938" (1937) and "Where Angels Go Trouble Follows" (1968).

There's Always Tomorrow was directed by Edward Sloman and produced by Carl Leammle for Universal Studios. It was remade in 1956 with Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray.

That's the headline of a newspaper that family patriarch Frank Morgan is reading as he is overlooked again by his wife and children after trying to get her to go to the theater with him and turned down because they are throwing a party. Wife Lois Wilson says he knows how much the children depend on her, but Morgan, wanting to spend some romantic, alone time with her, as usual gets the short end of the stick and is rejected. The only one who gives him any attention in the household is, ironically, his spunky cook/housekeeper, played by none other than Margaret Hamilton. Yes, long before "The Wizard of Oz" where they shared absolutely no scenes, Morgan and Hamilton worked together, appearing in at least three films-this mid 1930's soap opera with a male leading character, another film the same year (RKO Radio's "By Your Leave" with Hamilton also as the housekeeper and Morgan as another neglected family man) and briefly in 1938's "Stablemates" where Hamilton was a passenger on a train complaining about Morgan's beauty products. Hamilton is very funny as she gets to briefly explain her own marital history.

As Morgan stands on the family porch, a very attractive woman (Binnie Barnes) approaches him, looking for a family he's never heard of. It turns out she's his former employee who has held long unreciprocated feelings for him, and needing some companionship, he takes her to the theater instead. Before long, they are spending every Thursday night together, although it is insinuated that there's nothing other than a friendly get-together without becoming an affair. Oldest son Robert Taylor happens to spot Morgan heading to her apartment, and after he leaves, Taylor and his siblings (along with Taylor's girlfriend) go into her apartment after their car breaks down. Taylor is very bitter about the whole thing, but his younger siblings all begin to realize it is their neglect which has driven their father into another woman's apartment. The siblings all begin to plot different ways to bring their parents back together, but it really comes down to one thing: will they wake up and see why Morgan had to even consider spending time with another woman?

This forgotten Universal woman's picture is ironic because it focuses on the husband, not the wife or mistress, with ample time for the children to begin to see things from a different angle. Twin sons (obviously very close) get to dress in a very funny elephant costume while trying to understand what has driven their father away, while the one daughter begins to see things from a more realistic sense, leaving Taylor to stew in his own bitter juices. It's all nicely staged, but perhaps a bit too nicely. Barnes has a speech to the children where she tells them the truth behind the relationship without letting on that she knows who they are. Then, she shows up at his house in the end, and gives another speech to them. Her overly noble (and extremely chatty) character is too good to be true, but in spite of all that, it's hard not to like any of the characters here.

Ironically, this was remade two decades later with Barbara Stanwyck (by then the ex-Mrs. Robert Taylor) as the career woman reunited with old flame Fred MacMurray. The very same year as this, she was co-starring with Morgan in a soapy woman's picture named "A Lost Lady". The Stanwyck/MacMurray/Joan Bennett (as the wife) version seems to be the more well known version of this, given the full Ross Hunter treatment and directed by Douglas Sirk, then at the height of his popularity after "Magnificent Obsession". Both versions seem artificial in their tellings of a story which just needed a little more spice to be truly believable but they are both equally enjoyable in spite of those minor issues.