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Love Is on the Air
A newscaster gets demoted for exposing the town's criminal activities over the airwaves.
Release : | 1937 |
Rating : | 5.4 |
Studio : | Warner Bros. Pictures, |
Crew : | Art Direction, Director of Photography, |
Cast : | Ronald Reagan June Travis Eddie Acuff Ben Welden Robert Barrat |
Genre : | Crime Mystery Romance |
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I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much
A Masterpiece!
if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.
Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.
Warner Bros. 'B' picture starring Ronald Reagan in his first film as a radio reporter who gets in trouble going after corrupt city officials. So he's demoted to hosting a kids' show. The radio station boss hopes it will make him quit, as they can't fire him due to his contract. Will it work? Doubt it.Reagan is fine, likable and charming. My only complaint was the constant yelling of his lines, but that was undoubtedly because of Warner Bros. Most of the lead actors in their 'B' films at the time did this, and even some in their 'A' films. The title makes no sense really. It implies the film is a romantic comedy and it's not. This is a watchable way to pass an hour. Remake of Paul Muni's "Hi, Nellie."
Dick Powell had introduced a song called Love Is On The Air in Varsity Show which is a nice number. Therefore one might have expected a film with this title to be a musical. Though the song is played over the opening title credits, this film is far from a musical.Instead it is the film debut of former radio announcer Ronald Reagan playing a radio commentator who is getting the gangsters in his city all kinds of nervous with his hard hitting expose. But his sponsor Addison Richard is in league with those selfsame gangsters led by Ben Welden. He pressures station owner Robert Barrat to pull the plug on Reagan's show, but Ron's got a contract. Never mind the owner just assigns him to a kiddie show that June Travis formerly had.Of course she's all kinds of put out, but Ron's charm wins her over in a number of ways and oddly enough the kid's show provides him with a lead that eventually busts the racketeer control wide open.Casting Reagan as a radio commentator was no big acting stretch for him, but this did show the wisdom of Warner Brothers in developing new talent by giving them comfortable surroundings. Reagan's likability did the rest in this very easy to take B programmer based in part on Paul Muni's film Hi Nellie from a few years before.The Gipper's fans ought to be pleased.
When I saw the movie was entitled "Love is in the Air", I naturally assumed this was a romance, but there is really very little of that. Instead, it's much more of a suspense film with a touch of comedy and a tiny smidgen of romance! Ronald Reagan plays a hot-shot radio announcer--much like Walter Winchell. His specialty is talking about politics and exposing crime, but when the local mob sees he's poking his nose around a bit too close for comfort, they do what they can to de-rail his career. He is demoted to doing sappy children's programs and longs to return to his former job. Later, when Reagan gets a lead on the whereabouts of two people who might have been liquidated by the mob, he sets a pretty clever trap--leading to a dandy as well as violent little conclusion.While this is a very slight film and there isn't a lot to make it stand out from the crowd, LOVE IS IN THE AIR was a very good start for Reagan. This was his first film and he came off pretty well and less wooden than he did in a few of his later films. He was good as a fast-talking yet likable radio star--not much of a departure, as he had been a radio announcer before being discovered by Hollywood. Plus, as a "time passer", it's pretty watchable and interesting--especially considering it was pretty much a B-film with very low expectations from Warner Brothers Studio.
For a fellow who'd never acted before, Ronald Reagan carries this little programmer with panache. It bears little relation to the real world, but it's not a bad way to spend an hour. Reagan's skill as a radio announcer is exhibited, but he plays all the other required notes quite handily. The story gets a few unexpected twists, though most of it is hokum of the first degree. Ben Welden is always a welcome sight, here as a slightly more serious villain than he sometimes played. Most of the rest of the cast is pretty well B-level, competent but no great shakes. Reagan alone makes this worth viewing. He's likable, charming, energetic, and he handles dialogue better than just about anyone in the film. Quite an accomplishment for a newcomer.