Three on a Match (1932)

Three women who went to school together serendipitously meet up again. Mary (Joan Blondell) was the bad girl who spent time in reform school, Ruth (Bette Davis) went to secretary school, and Vivian (Ann Dvorak) who went to finishing school and married rich. Vivian has a bit of a crisis and runs off with a dashing young neer-do-well. This troubles here newly refound school chums greatly.

Viv's new beau (we'll call him Michael) has run up some gambling debts, so he tries to blackmail her ex by threatening to tell the press that his new wife was a bad girl who spent time in reform school. This doesn't work so he decides to kidnap their son. When the gamblers find out what Michael has done, they take over and raise the stakes.

Pronoun trouble, I know. It all makes sense on screen. Anyhow Bogart was one of the heavies. The two biggest names had fairly small parts. Bogie had five more years before anyone took him seriously. About the same for Davis.

Joan Blondell was a total hottie back in the day. I had seen her in a couple other movies during her old and fat days. Dvorak was a rising star back in the day but tried to have her contract terminated when she found out that she was being paid the same as the actor playing her 5 year old son. Davis was almost an afterthought here, not really playing a part in the story.


Well, this pre-code gem was supposed to be something but I didn't find it terribly interesting. Pre-code because it dealt with adultery, drug addiction, and briefly in a montage sequence it showed two women dancing. Horrors! Something of a snooze-fest, actually. AMRU 3. Speaking of horror ...