Pre-code Gem Other Men’s Women—

The film “Other Men’s Women” (1931) left me with a bad taste in my mouth. It’s a love triangle gone completely bad. But can any love triangle turn well? Grant Withers and Regis Toomey play the role of the men in love with the same women, a very young and beautiful Mary Astor. Mary Astor is happily married to Toomey until Withers steps into their lives. Withers falls in love with Mary and wants her bad. Toomey and Withers get into a fight on the job over Mary. The train derails and Toomey is blinded for life. Toomey is depressed over his blindness and feels like he is a burden to Mary. When the river floods, the now repentant Withers comes up with a plan to dam it. He plans to drive his engine across the bridge. I still don’t understand how this was supposed help dam it. He knows this will mean his death, but he needs atonement. Toomey hears of this plan and decides that he should be the one to die. He finds his way to the engine and drives it across the bridge and dies.

Withers, Regis, and Astor were great, but the supporting roles played by Jimmy Cagney and Joan Blondell steal the show! These two overshadowed the main star, and the plot for that matter. You will enjoy the pre-code frank lines in the movie. Blondell plays a tough-talking waitress which speaks her mind, and will smack a man when she is dissed. She doesn’t take anybody’s crap. Ah, the good old pre-code days. Cagney plays a friend of the two guys in the triangle. Cagney with his cool, smooth talking, wit, and the “in control,” kind of man ways will sweep you off your feet. And he does a dance number that will leave you in total awe. He is sweet in this film. Watch the trailer here

The movie has a soap opera kind of feel, but Cagney and Blondell steal the show and make it worth your while. Oh, and the climactic bridge collapse is pretty impressive for the day.