Best movie of this year hands down!

How sad is this?

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Tracy was always playing the hard guy in his days at Fox Films. He really didn't play normal or sympathetic figures until he moved to MGM. Here Tracy plays Joe Graham, a telephone company troubleshooter. He's offered a promotion - a job as supervisor of 14 other troubleshooters, and tells his boss he doesn't want the job. The money means nothing to him, not sitting around in an office means everything to him. He says he just wants to be happy and for now being a troubleshooter does that. He's apparently seen the world, hopping freighters for China or India, or wherever, and just picking up odd jobs until he wanted to come home.He's dating Ethel (Constance Cummings), but their relationship is turbulent. He's jealous of everyone, and of Dan in particular. Dan's a bad guy, working both as a troubleshooter and in an illegal gambling hall. Heck, he'll do anything to pick up money if it's illegal. Joe knows this and keeps mum about it - not because he's crooked himself, he just has a philosophy of not meddling. But when something Dan has done gets blamed on Joe's new partner, Casey (Jack Oakie), Joe speaks up, gets Dan fired, and Joe punches Dan in the nose for good measure. Since Dan has been circling around Ethel, he tells Ethel a one sided story of what happened - that Joe beat him up AND got him fired just because Joe was jealous. Ethel breaks if off with Joe and is drawn even closer to Dan, with whom she sympathizes.The point here is, both of these people are being unreasonable and not communicating. Ethel never bothers to hear Joe's side of the story. Joe goes around accusing Ethel of being untrue to him, when she has often just gone out by herself on nights when Joe was troubleshooting. In the meantime, Joe's goofy partner hits it off with Ethel's roommate, played by Arlene Judge, although the mutual attraction had me scratching my head.So Ethel quits the phone company and starts working for Dan, who is actually running an illegal enterprise out his rented office of which Ethel is completely unaware. Now you might think, I can see where this is going. Dan is going to out himself as a bad character, Ethel will see the error of her ways, possibly in danger of bodily harm from Dan, Joe saves the day, all is well.Actually, that's not what happens at all. The turn of events is completely unexpected and the last half of this film is particularly exciting. I'll let you watch and find out what does happen. Let me just say that even an earthquake enters in as a plot point! Great shades of "San Francisco"! Let me just say in closing that I never thought Paramount or Fox really knew what to do with Jack Oakie. It seems like he did his best stuff at Universal - "Chance of a Lifetime", "Bowery to Broadway", and "That's The Spirit" come to mind. At any rate I'd recommend this one. It certainly does not take you where you'd expect it to take you.

Initially, I didn't like this film very much. After all, Joe (Spencer Tracy) was a one-dimensional guy who spends so much of the film getting angry and socking people. This sort of character sure is much different from the subtle and well-acted characters Tracy is famous for performing over the years...most likely because this is early in his career and he hadn't yet established himself as a top actor. I was almost ready to turn it off, actually, but fortunately stuck with it and I am glad I did. It wasn't so much because the story about wire tappings was that great but because the studio was able to take actual footage of a real earthquake and seamlessly integrated it into the film...making for a really exciting finale that catches you by surprise. Worth seeing.By the way, although it's not a severe example, the film clearly is a Pre-Code picture (coming out just a few months before the toughened Production Code was enforced). When Jack Oakie's character is calling various phone numbers, one turns out to be for a brothel...and he saves that number for later!

The lives of telephone repair men are explored in an overly plotty comedy with contrasting types playing off of each other with both tough and humorous dialog. Spencer Tracy and Jack Oakie reminded me of Bing Crosby and Bob Hope in the best "Road" movies with their quite opposite personalities. Tracy is hard and cynical, while Oakie is a good-natured jokester who lightens up his initially unamused partner quite a bit in spite of the fact that they both love the same woman. During the course of the movie, they discover a dead body, get involved in a bank heist and manager to get out of a burning building where they were held hostage. The clever dialog helps the film rise above its convoluted plot which runs all over the place in a short running time. A hard-boiled dame played by Judith Wood adds some zest to the conclusion, the other women in the plot not very interesting.

Tracy aces the Bell Telephone Company trouble shooter hero character. Incident is piled high as Spence takes a night time 'phone emergency, with new side kick Okie in tow, and gets mixed in with the speak easy low lifes at the club, where he's repairing the 'phone. Misunderstandings follow with switch operator lady friend Cummings and rival gone to the bad Conway, involving wire tapping and a bank job. Throw in the 1933 Long Beach earth quake no less. They go on too long past the fire scene, which should be the climax and major talents like director Wellman, Tracy and Cummings must have regarded this as light duties but they seem to be in their element and deliver lively entertainment for the undemanding.