The Stand-In [1937] (REGION 1) (NTSC)

Customer Reviews:

An amusing romantic comedy with some sharp elbows aimed at Hollywood; Leslie Howard, Joan Blondell, Humphrey Bogart.......2007-09-27

Atterbury Dodd, a careful accountant from New York, has just spent some time trying to find out what exactly is going on at Colossal Film Studios. "Hasn't anyone an answer for stupidity besides 'that's the picture business'?" he asks. Says a studio worker standing next to him, "Sorry, Mr. Dodd, but that's the only answer."

Stand-In is a good-natured ribbing at the making of movies. It takes some sharp-elbowed hits at budget manipulation, sycophancy, techniques to run up costs, untalented stars, inflated egos, the differences between what labor and management are paid and unscrupulous business dealings. I wonder how the movie was ever permitted to be released, much less made.

Dodd (Leslie Howard) is a precise genius with numbers who realizes that when his bank decides to sell it's interests in Colossal, it will be accepting a low-ball offer. He stands his ground to the bank's chair, and is sent to Hollywood to take over the studio, find out the real worth...or be fired if he's wrong. Dodd's journey to prove he is right, and to become a man who can laugh and fall in love, has just begun. He meets Lester Plum (Joan Blondell), a funny, attractive and poorly paid former child star who now works as a stand-in at Colossal. He meets Tom Potts (Jack Carson), the loud-mouth studio PR man, who is always ready with a braying laugh, an expense account charged to Colossal and a girl. He meets Doug Quentain (Humphrey Bogart), a producer and former drunk, who is suspicious that a flop-in-the-making, Sex and Satan, is deliberately running up expenses. He wants the production closed down. Oh, the people Dodd meets...egoist directors, manipulative business associates, no-talent leading ladies. And through it all, Atterbury Dodd with his quizzical sincerity, his logic, his lists and his naivety, tries to make sense of things. He comes to realize that workers aren't just units, that studios should make good films, that Douglas Quentain is a true friend...and that Miss Plum has very nice legs. In fact, at the end of the movie, we see that the final point on Dodd's list of to-do items in his notebook is "Propose to Miss Plum."

Stand-In is an insider's look at movie-making machinations. It's handled as an amusing exploration from the point of view of a likable and naive outsider. It's a romantic comedy, but with some sharp edges for Hollywood. Leslie Howard, always the intellectual leading man, proves once again how successful he was in convincing women he was a romantic lead in need of protecting and cuddling. Joan Blondell is, as usual, funny, a little acerbic and a little tender. Humphrey Bogart with this movie showed emphatically that he could carry a romantic role as well as handle comedy. It must have been frustrating to immediately be sent back to playing second-fiddle hoods to Jimmy Cagney and Edward G. Robinson. It would be four years and 17 movies before he was able to establish his own star persona.

The DVD presentation is much better than average. There are no extras.

Wonderful comic look at Hollywood........2004-03-28

In this delightful film Leslie Howard plays a brilliant mathematician who is dispatched to a Hollywood studio by the owners to find out if it is worth keeping. Howard is an innocent who has spent his life immersed in the study of mathematics and knows nothing whatever about the movie business. In his efforts to understand the strange new world he is plunged into, he is helped by Joan Blondell, a former child star now working as a stand-in (her hilarious impression of Shirley Temple is one of the highlights of the film), and Humphrey Bogart as a tough, cynical producer. Howard's encounters with the varied inhabitants of Hollywood are very funny, from the glamorous star of the movie to a performing seal. The film builds to a rousing climax where the studio workers combine to defeat the closure of the studio, and ends with the most touching marriage proposal I have ever seen in a film. Smashing.

Average customer rating:

Stand-In [1937] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Humphrey Bogart
Manufacturer: Image Entertainment
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

All Drama | Drama | Categories | DVD | Video

Drama | Classics | Categories | DVD | Video

DVD | Format (binding_browse-bin) | Refinements | DVD | Video
ASIN: 6307423862
Release Date: 2003-01-28

DVD:

DVD List

DVD