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Highly Overrated But Still Good

A Major Disappointment

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

REMEMBER THE DAY (20th Century-Fox, 1941), directed by Henry King, bears no connection nor is it a sequel to Paramount's comedy-drama, REMEMBER THE NIGHT (1940) starring Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray. Though it's not hard to confuse these similar movie titles, they are as different as night and day. For this production, starring Claudette Colbert, on loan-out assignment from her home-base of Paramount Pictures, it offers her an occasional opportunity to break away from her assortment of amusing comedies to something on a different level, that of a devoted school teacher with recollections of her past, and the one student who took part of those fine memories. After viewing REMEMBER THE DAY, there's no question it was a box-office success. Through the passage of time, however, the film has somehow slipped into obscurity, and quite undeservedly. Though many of the featured players, with the exception of John Payne, are not quite the marque names one would expect, the sole focus is on Colbert from start to finish, in a role worth remembering, even for just a day.Set in Washington, D.C., Tuesday, June 25, 1940, the story opens with a front page newspaper spread reading, "National big-wigs arrive for Dewey Roberts banquet." Moments later, Nora Tindel (Claudette Colbert), a middle-aged schoolteacher, comes to the Mayflower Hotel where a crowd of people await for the guest of honor, the presidential candidate, Senator Dewey Roberts, who happened to be one of Miss Tindel's former students. After being escorted to a seat near the secret elevator where Dewey Roberts is to come out, the orchestra that had been playing to the popular Glenn Miller song, "Chattanooga Choo Choo," switches to Dewey's favorite song, "Back Home Again in Indiana." As Miss Tindel listens to the music, she recollects to the day she met the future senator, Friday, April 14, 1916, in the classroom of Auburn Grammar School in Indiana where she fills in for a Miss Fitch for the rest of the semester. Being a new teacher, Miss Tindel starts her career knowing her students, especially the somewhat rebellious Dewey Roberts (Douglas Croft), named after Admiral George Dewey of the United States Navy. Student and teacher first come to disagreement when Miss Tindel prepares on taking her class to the matinée of William Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" followed by a picnic the very Saturday of the upcoming baseball game against Rome as coached by gym teacher, Dan Hopkins (John Payne). Eventually the conflicting events come to mutual terms, leading to a fine relationship between teacher and student and their interest and knowledge of ships (Miss Tindel, daughter of a sea captain, raised in the whaling colony of New Bedford, Massachusetts), and a romance that blossoms between Miss Tindel and Mr. Hopkins. After learning Nora and Dan spent the summer together at Willow Springs, Mr. Steele (Francis Pierlot), the school principal, makes demands on their dismissal. However, Dan resigns in order to have Nora retain her teaching position, a job she so loves. Later, Nora and Dan's secret marriage causes friction between the jealous Dewey and his favorite teacher. After a few more incidents depicted in Miss Tindel's life, and whatever became of her husband, the story moves forward to the present day as Nora awaits for her glimpse of Dewey Roberts, and a heartfelt conclusion not to be missed.REMEMBER THE DAY, based on the play by Philip Higley and Philip Dunning, is a warm, sensitive story that plays with warmth and conviction. As much as the idea of teacher being reunited with former student now in public office might seem original, a little known gem titled GRAND OLD GIRL (RKO Radio, 1935) starring May Robson, consisted a similar concept but not the exact story. In it, Robson plays the elderly school teacher who's reunited with former student, the president of the United States. Though Shepperd Strudwick, credited as John Shepperd, gets third billing in the cast listing as the adult Dewey Roberts, much of the story belongs to Douglas Croft playing the same character at age 13. A natural child actor, best known for playing Lou Gehrig as a boy in THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES (1942), and George M. Cogan as a boy in YANKEE DOODLE DANDY (1942), whose character grows to become Gary Cooper and James Cagney respectively, he's not only given more to do here, but gives an excellent performance all around. The fact that Croft and Sheppard nearly resemble one another makes their characters even more passable. Another bonus that makes REMEMEBR THE DAY worth recommending is the close-to-accurate hair styles and clothing for its actors depicted in the 1916-17 era as opposed to some movies set in another time frame having its actors costumed in modern-day fashion. A worthy offering, especially from former school teachers with fond memories of their former students, especially one who stands out among the others, leaving one to wonder where are they now? Other members in the cast include Ann Todd (Kate Hill, a fellow student with a crush on Dewey); Frieda Inescort (Ann Hill, as a woman); Jane Seymour (Dewey's mother); Harry Hayden (Dewey's father); Billy Dawson (Steve Hill); George Ernest (Bill Tower, the hotel bellboy and former Miss Tindal student) Anne Revere (Nadine Price); among others.Not shown regularly on commercial television since the 1970s, and never distributed to home video but available on DVD since 2013 by Cinema Archives, REMEMBER THE DAY did get the time of day with broadcasts on numerous cable channels, including Cinemax (1986), American Movie Classics (1991-92), Fox Movie Channel, and eventually Turner Classic Movies (TCM premiere: August 18, 2014). Henry King, an underrated movie director, through his fine direction, provides a first-rate production where its theme song, "Till We Meet Again" would have any first-time viewer thinking to one-self whenever REMEMBER THE DAY should be available for cable TV viewing again. (****)

I'm trying to think if I ever saw a film starring Claudette Colbert that I didn't like. None that I can remember, and this film is no exception. It's an utterly charming story of a school teacher with 2 men -- an elementary school boy that has a crush on her, and a fellow-teacher who marries her. Along the way, the teacher almost loses her job when she spends a summer in the same resort (gasp!) as her future husband. A scandal is averted when the male teacher resigns, but before too long they secretly marry. Eventually, the young boy grows up to be a presidential candidate, and the husband disappears in World War I. At the beginning of the film, the teacher is trying to meet the presidential candidate to wish him well, and at the end of the film she succeeds. In between, the back-story is told via flashback.Claudette Colbert is wonderful as the teacher...but she was always wonderful! John Payne was excellent as her future husband, and Payne is an actor who may not have been given his due; always dependable. Shepperd Strudwick plays the boy as an adult, while Douglas Croft plays him exceptionally well as the boy.While I can't quite say this is a "great" film, it's certainly a very, very good one. It only finally popped up on TCM very recently.

This begins at a political party convention in Washington, D.C., as candidate Dewey Roberts (Shepperd Strudwick) prepares to deliver his speech to accept his party's nomination for a U.S. Presidential bid, when his former schoolteacher, Nora Trinell (Claudette Colbert), arrives to attempt to capture a glimpse of and to offer a note of congratulations to one of whom she feels proud to have influenced during his formative years.But the program experiences delay, as attendees and a national radio hookup await the arrival of Candidate Roberts, Miss Trinell reminisces of her arriving from Connecticut into a rural Indiana community back in 1915, to instruct her eighth-grade class, which includes three lively pupils: Young Dewey Roberts (Douglas Croft), Kate Hill (Ann E. Todd), and Peter (William Henderson), Nora detaining the three for misconduct after dismissal.In the meantime, when Nora announces to her class a field trip to the park for a Shakespeare play this coming Saturday, Dewey reports that the school's baseball team has a scheduling conflict, asks to be excused, and runs down the staircase to report to his Coach, Dan Hopkins (John Payne), who decides to have a word with the adamant yet flexible Miss Trinell.Nora and Dan resolve their differences for now before school Principal, Mr. Steele (Francis Pierlot), as the two instructors begin their secret courtship, beginning with an independent Nora's prioritizing career over romance, and soon jeopardizing each of their careers, as marriage is forbidden for a teacher, according to school policy mandates, in 1915.Dewey's parents, Mrs. Roberts (Jane Seymour) and Mr. Roberts (Harry Hayden) demonstrate a liking to his caring instructor, as Nora delivers Dewey's assignments during his bout with a brief illness. Upon her visit, Dewey shows Nora the model boats, which his father has helped him to construct, as ship-making has become a common bond between the two from the onset (since Dewey and Peter argued about the brig, the bark and ship rigged vessels, which, of course, Nora would correct, as her grandfather had been a Naval officer. Kate could not mind her own business during the debate, and had something to say about it, which is the reason as to why she had been detained that day.)Well, fellow instructor Miss Nadine Price (Anne Revere) shares residence at a boarding house with Nora and serves as her confidante of sorts although Nora keeps her mounting feeling about Dan to herself for the most part. Dewey, by now, also admires Nora greatly and dismisses any notion that Nora and Dan are weak enough to fall for each other.Nora completes her partial term of the academic year to vacation for the summer with Nadine and other female instructors at a resort, at which Nora expresses a lack of interest in playing croquet with Nadine or lounging with the other ladies, so when Dan drives by to rescue Nora, they decide to elope in secret, and to spend the remainder of the summer at a different resort, from whence they each send Dewey a postcard featuring the sailboat, "The Mabel." Later in the autumn, when Dewey shows Principal Steele the postcards to prove his point after another argument with Peter, Mr. Steele puts two and two together to confront Dan Hopkins, who secretly sacrifices his career to permit Nora to stay on at her post, and so he enlists in the Service and receives his orders to sail to France.Seasoned with a nice touch of nostalgia, Nora and Nadine light wax candles upon the Christmas spruce, as the boarding house rings in New Year 1916. Dan stops by for a visit, to stroll around the town square with Nora, before his train arrives to deliver him to the docks to sail to France before the U.S. enters WWI.Eventually, Nora transfers from Indiana to a school in Washington, D.C., at which she teaches for the remainder of her career, and garners additional classroom alumni who attend the gathering for Candidate Dewey Roberts. But amid all of the pressure of facing a national audience, will Dewey also "Remember the Day?" This also features Frieda Inescort as Mrs. Dewey Roberts, Marie Blake as Miss Cartwright, Selmer Jackson as Graham, William Halligan as Tom Hanlon, and Chick Chandler as Mr. Mason the Reporter.And the film is released on Christmas Day, 1941, soon after the U.S. enters WWII, to reaffirm sentimental values of patriotism through the eyes of dedicated adults and youths alike.

Henry King did some masterworks: Stella Dallas, Tol'able David, Alexander Ragtime Band, Ramona, etc., but also some impersonal films (The Black Swan, King of the Kyber rifles, etc.). I think that "Remember the day" lays in between these categories, and I am a bit confused by its positive reviews in IMDb. First of all, there is no chemistry between Colbert and Payne. Here, Payne overacts and looks misplaced as a romantic hero (think of his character portrayed by Power or Fonda). We all think of Payne, instead, as the cynical heavy in the films of Phil Karlson or Allan Dwan. Besides, too much time and sugar is dedicated to the romance between he a she, and too little time to the love of the boy Dewey for his teacher, not to speak of the awkward and abrupt final scene and the horrible actor ¿John Shepperd? who portrays adult Dewey. The direction of Henry King is, except in that final scene, smooth and fluid as ever, but the problems of the film are Payne and the script. The character of Dewey, mainly adult Dewey, should had been more developed.