Watch Me and My Gal For Free

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

In one of the screen's most realistic romances, Spencer Tracy and Joan Bennett play a cop and a waitress during the depression and prohibition who meet, crack wise, fall in love, argue some and fall more in love, all the time still cracking wise and arguing even more. There's a story, but it really doesn't concern these lovers, only surrounding his job and her sister, a newly married woman whose gangster ex-boyfriend escapes from prison and hides in her attic. The criminal story goes with the setting, the era and the hottest trend in pre-code films, but it is the dialog you will remember, one of the juiciest screenplays of the time. Bennett will delight you, cast against type as the tough-talking but ultimately tender good girl who can't believe that she's in love with a cop, joking with him about his flat feet yet never ceasing her love for him once she realizes he's serious about them being together. The two have an adorable love scene where they coo baby talk like affections at each other while their mind tells the audiences what they are really thinking.There's also several scenes with an obnoxious drunk who won't go away, showing that even during prohibition, an obviously intoxicated man could roam the city streets and cops would pay him little mind except to insult him (and sometimes physically assault them). Veteran director Raoul Walsh whose credits go back to the early silent era, takes this delightful script, runs the camera man into a furious frenzy with the speediness of it all, and demands quick, non-static editing that moves along like a rat in the sewer.There are so many fresh ideas in this film that you never feel bored, wanting to capture every delightful line that Tracy and Bennett throw at each other. It is ironic that 18 years later, these two stars would play a happily married couple in "Father of the Bride" with a beautiful daughter (someone named Elizabeth Taylor) where Tracy would also speak in character while his character remained silent.

Spencer Tracy's Fox films are an interesting lot and one can count himself lucky if he gets to see any of his early work. For some reason the films that he did at that first studio he was contracted to are rarely seen, some I suspect are lost. Fortunately Me And My Gal was not. And it's a real Irish treat.Me And My Gal casts Tracy in a part that either James Cagney or Pat O'Brien would have scored brilliantly with at Warner Brothers. He's a happy go lucky tough Irish cop who falls for wisecracking waitress Joan Bennett. Joan's just fine, but Joan Blondell or Barbara Stanwyck would have been perfect casting. Bennett has a sister Marian Nixon who is married to George Chandler, but fooling around with gangster Frank Walsh. When he makes a daring prison break he takes refuge in Nixon's house while Chandler who is a merchant seaman is away. Also in the house is Chandler's father a wheelchair bound paralyzed World War veteran played by silent movie pioneer Henry B. Walthall. Walthall has an interesting way of communicating to the outside world his thoughts that prove ultimately to be Walsh's undoing.Some nice snappy dialog banter between Tracy and Bennett is what really moves this film along. At one point these two do a really great parody of Strange Interlude by Eugene O'Neill. It should be seen beside the film version of same that MGM did that same year with Clark Gable and Norma Shearer and one the Marx Brothers did in Animal Crackers. It's as funny as the Marx Brothers.Tracy's role here is very typical of the kind of roughneck parts he did in his early years for the most part. He was even doing the same roles in his first few MGM contract parts. His advancement to becoming what many consider to be the screen's greatest actor ever came when Jeanette MacDonald asked for him to be cast as Father Mullin in San Francisco. That opened a career whole new vistas for him.Still these early films do have a lot going for them. Write to TCM and get some of these out on DVD and shown on television. Let's hope many of them still exist.

Raoul Walsh was one of the greatest directors of the '30's and '40s, mainly because of the reason that his movies were always such of a high quality and so entertaining to watch. This is a movie from before the real glory days of Walsh and it seemed like he was still having difficulties with this movie to find its proper style and approach.The different story lines with the different characters just don't always connect with each other. The movie also takes too long with its story to set up things and introduce its characters. The movie is already a real short one and it wastes too much time with its set up. It doesn't even become fully clear what this movie is truly going to be about until like half an hour before the end.At first this movie even seems as if its going to be a comedy but not a really funny one though. It then picks a romantic approach and after that it turns more into a thriller/drama. This of course also makes the movie a fairly disjointed one and also works out bad for the movie its story, as well as its style.It's mostly the last halve hour that still makes this movie a perfectly watchable enough movie. It's also then that the story becomes truly solid and the movie also turns into a more original one to watch. Before that the movie was mostly just being formulaic.It really isn't Raoul Walsh best movie, also in terms of directing, editing and camera-work. It's a cheap and simple looking movie that lacks in style and a good main clear approach of the story. I can see and understand what Raoul Walsh tried to achieve and tried to blend some of the most successful genres of its time into one movie. It's an approach he much better executed in his later movie "The Strawberry Blond" and I'm sure that there are a couple of more better examples to mention but I haven't seen all Raoul Walsh movies obviously. It's not as if this movie is an horrible attempt and is one bad movie but it nevertheless can't be seen as a successful attempt either.The movie also features Spencer Tracy in one of his earliest roles. His acting seemed modern for its time and he did a great job in this movie.A movie that luckily gets better toward its end.7/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

'Me and My Gal' is an entertaining romance/mystery/screwball comedy, featuring charming performances by Spencer Tracy and Joan Bennett, 18 years before they would pair again in the classic 'Father of the Bride.' Both stars are at their early best here, zinging wisecracks at each other at a frantic pace. Joan Bennett is the real surprise, shining in a role that would have been well suited for Myrna Loy or Claudette Colbert. Worthwhile for the two stars.