Big Brown Eyes

I was jolted by a scene of violence in “Big Brown Eyes” (1936). What starts out as a cute if somewhat formulaic comedy starring a sparring Cary Grant and Joan Bennett turns sour and casts a pall over the remainder of its 76-minute running time, a pall the film never quite recovers from.

Gangster/Jewel Thief Lloyd Nolan is having a discussion with fellow jewel robbers on a park bench when an argument erupts between the two parties. Two gangsters knock Nolan down and he responds by drawing a gun and firing at their fleeing selves. He misses but instead hits a baby carriage and kills the infant.

What was director and co-writer Raoul Walsh thinking?

Killing an infant seems unusually harsh to get a plot point across. Why make the victim an infant? I’m not trying to be facetious, but couldn’t an adult passerby have been killed instead?

Later on for a second or two, its fun seeing the nattily-dressed Nolan in court, casually trimming his fingernails and without a care in the world. Thanks to a fix he knows he’s going to be acquitted. But then we see the grieving mother, dressed in black, silently weeping and when the not guilty verdict is read she can barely stand and has to be helped out of the courtroom.

It just sucks all the joy out of the movie.

Cary Grant plays Detective Sergeant Danny Barr, who’s trying to crack a ring of jewel thieves. When not detecting, he’s getting a haircut and manicure at a gloriously Art Deco barber shop that reminds me of one featured in the wonderful Carole Lombard/Fred MacMurray film “Hands Across the Table” (1935).

Since both films come from Paramount, it would not surprise me if the same barber shop set was used. (While the film is a Walter Wanger production, if Wanger had a distribution arrangement with Paramount, its possible Paramount let him use some of their existing sets.)

Everyone seems to hang out in the barber shop, including members of the jewel thief ring, including Benny Battle (Douglas Fowley) and his seemingly respectable boss Richard Morey (Walter Pidgeon).

Danny and manicurist Eve Fallon (Joan Bennett) have an attraction for each other, but they seem to fight more than kiss. There’s one amusing scene where, with a door between them, Grant pretends to be romancing a woman in the hallway as Bennett listens in.

Benny Battle is attracted to Eve’s friend Bessie Blair (Isabell Jewell). (Alliteration will do that.) They meet in the park just before the shooting, so Bessie is able to I.D. Benny.

He won’t confess though, so (only in the movies) former manicurist turned crime beat reporter Eve concocts, very cleverly, a means to make Benny confess to the police and finger Lloyd Nolan.

In this movie, Cary Grant still isn’t THE Cary Grant, so he’s still in his learning stage. He does OK, I guess, but the seemingly effortless charm would come later. Still, he and Bennett work well together, though I enjoy more the other film they made together the same year, “The Wedding Present.”

Later in the movie, one of the gangsters who intimidates Bessie looks like a very young Morris Ankrum. IMDB does not list him as being in the cast, but it sure does look like him. You may not know the name, but you would surely recognize the face. Ankrum played generals in a slew of 1950s science fiction movies and played the judge in many a Perry Mason episode.

“Big Brown Eyes” is a trifle, and no more. The baby killing scene is very unpleasant and unfortunately it’s probably the most memorable thing in the movie. Not a very auspicious quality to be remembered for.

“Big Brown Eyes” is part of a very affordably-priced DVD collection titled “Cary Grant Screen Legend Collection). Other titles include “Thirty Day Princess” (1934) co-starring Sylvia Sidney”; “Kiss and Make Up” (1934) with Genevieve Tobin; “Wings in the Dark” (1935), an early pairing with Myrna Loy; and the aforementioned “Wedding Present.”

I haven’t seen most of these so I’m looking forward to watching the rest of these. It’s always interesting to see early appearances by future stars. These titles may not be essential Cary Grant, but as a bedrock to a great career, these efforts can’t be denied.