How sad is this?

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

Fans of the divine Joel McCrea and the adorable Jean Arthur will enjoy watching them doing the romantic fencing needed to prolong the love story aspect of the movie. The trouble is that the other aspect of the movie, the bank robbery, is really, really dumb, and makes even 72 minutes seem long, with its plot that is ridiculous and totally unbelievable both strategically and psychologically. Every time the movie comes round to it, it seems even less believable and more tiresome.That's not the only reason for the low rating. There is an extended joke involving a dead child that is horrible and offensive, and a quick joke involving a blind beggar that is also pretty tasteless. Yes, people at that time did not react the same way we do, but other movies did not commit such gross lapses of taste that, for me anyway, threw the comedy off the track.

If you can forgive the cruel prank played on reporter Joel McCrea at the very beginning by his lesson-teaching boss (Thomas Mitchell) with the help of a nutty actress (Jean Arthur), then you can find some amusement with everything that happens next. It all surrounds the theft of a valuable gem, and the romance that blossoms between McCrea and Arthur after the initial misunderstanding. The screenplay takes the storyline all over the map and while you are wondering if you've missed some important development, you suddenly realize that this is the mood the script writer was going for. It is perhaps a bit more complex than a screwball comedy can be, and the cruel element of the opening might even turn the viewer off to turn the movie off, but stick with it. The sticky plot twists are sometimes ridiculous. Herman Bing, the S.Z. Sakall of the 1930's, overacts with gusto, and appears to be the influence for John Banner's Sergeant Schultz of TV's "Hogan's Heroes".

Joel McCrea and Jean Arthur have an "Adventure in Manhattan" in this 1936 film, also starring Thomas Mitchell and Reginald Owen, and directed by Edward Ludwig.McCrea plays a sharp criminal reporter who is convinced that a world-famous thief, believed dead, is actually very much alive and responsible for some big heists that have taken place. He meets Arthur, a young actress, and the two fall in love as McCrea tries to prove his theory.This is a really enjoyable film, with delightful performances by McCrea and Arthur. It's a bit all over the place - part screwball, part mystery. I frankly didn't see much of Nick and Nora Charles in it as others have. But the dialogue is bright, McCrea and Arthur have good chemistry, and some aspects of the mystery are good. McCrea is often thought of as sort of a poor man's Gary Cooper: a handsome, hunky all-American. In westerns there is more of a similarity, with Cooper having more gravitas, but McCrea's lighter touch and more overt personality lent themselves well to comedy. That's where he and Cooper parted company.Enjoyable, and with a better script, it would have been terrific.

This isn't a bad film. The problem is, that this type of mystery comedy was done so much better in The Thin Man films that it pales in comparison. Plus, the character played by Joel McCrea is pretty unlikable, unlike Nick Charles.McCrea is a top crime reporter for the newspapers. His insights and predictions are uncanny and the problem is he is 100% sure of himself and quite the fat-head! Because he's so smug, I found it hard to like him and couldn't see why nice Jean Arthur was taken in by him. So what if he was so smart--he's still kind of a jerk. As a result, the chemistry just isn't quite right.The plot itself concerns a master criminal that everyone EXCEPT McCrea thinks is dead. Throughout the film, McCrea swears he will eventually catch this "gentleman criminal", though this man's exact identity is unknown.The acting is decent and the film does offer a few laughs and interesting moments--but not enough to make this a "must see" film.