JohnHowardReid Review of Once in a Lifetime

Once in a Lifetime (1932)

Over-Acted, Over-Written, Over-Talkative, Dumbly Done

[3/10 · 6 August 2012]

I was in seventh heaven when I found what turned out to be a very good copy of this one in my local DVD store. (It's on the VintageFilmBuff label if anyone is interested, though the firm ceased business back in 2010). Was I disappointed! It's basically a photographed stage play, and Russell Mack is not exactly a director of distinction. He seems content to point the camera at the players and leave it at that. Talk about talk, talk, talk! Just about everybody shouts their lines in this movie as if they were on a theatre stage rather than a sound stage. Gregory Ratoff (playing a parody of Universal's own studio head, Carl Laemmle) is the worst offender, but others are not far behind. Jack Oakie, who specialized in dumb roles, is also especially stupid in this one. With Ratoff and Oakie mugging away verbosely, there's little room left for the other principals, although Aline MacMahon gives her steady-as-she-goes character a game try. But both Miss MacMahon and Russell Hopton (who takes a stab at what seems to be building into a big role in the opening scenes), are soon reduced to the background while Oakie and Ratoff tread center stage. And, even more disappointingly, despite her prominent billing, Sidney Fox is hardly in the film at all. If it were not for "Boots, Boots, Boots!", you wouldn't even notice her!