Accent on Youth (1935)

User Rating:

6.2/10   

Director:

Wesley Ruggles

Writers:

Samson Raphaelson (play)
Herbert Fields (adaptation)

Release Date:

23 August 1935 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Romance

Tagline:

STEPHEN COULDN'T RESIST ONE LAST FLING AT YOUTH! (original poster- all caps)

Plot:

A young secretary falls in love with her boss, a middle-aged playwright. Complications ensue when her boss' son falls for her.

Plot Keywords:

Playwright | Secretary | Broadway | Stock Footage | Actor

Cast

Sylvia Sidney	...	Linda Brown
Herbert Marshall	...	Steven Gaye
Phillip Reed	...	Dickie Reynolds
Holmes Herbert	...	Frank Galloway
Catherine Doucet	...	Eleanor Darling
Astrid Allwyn	...	Genevieve Lang
Ernest Cossart	...	Flogdell
Lon Chaney Jr.	...	Chuck
Dick Foran	...	Butch (as Nick Foran)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Elsie Clark	...	Janet
Janet Elsie Clark	...	Fiancée
Fifi D'Orsay
Samuel S. Hinds	...	Benham
Donald Meek	...	Orville
Florence Roberts	...	Mrs. Benham
Albert Taylor	...	Cashier
Laura Treadwell	...	Mrs. Galloway

Runtime:

USA:77 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Noiseless Recording)

Certification:

USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | USA:Approved

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

One of over 700 Paramount Productions, filmed between 1929 and 1949, which were sold to MCA/Universal in 1958 for television distribution, and have been owned and controlled by Universal ever since.

Movie Connections:

Version of Mr. Music (1950)

Sophisticated but not dead

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Playwright Steven Gaye (Herbert Marshall) puts great emphasis on youth. You see, there is something "grand" about being young, so grand that all youth deserve to experience young love. Thus, he spends the whole of the film debating with himself about the propriety, apparent unseemliness, and selfishness of a fifty-year-old man falling in love with a woman in her twenties. But Linda (Sylvia Sidney) enlightens him. What if woman chases man rather than man chasing woman? In that case, a May-December affair is okay, at least for a play. You'll see that in his personal life, Steven feels differently and thus tries to spare Linda the mistake of latching onto him when she is "so darn young." Thus, we get the obligatory improbable romance between Linda and a young man who really isn't much to her (or probably any woman's) liking. Although it's 1935, Linda isn't forced to remain with this overbearing man to prove she is good. Happily, the writers knew irreconcilable differences when they saw them and thought, perhaps an unorthodox pairing really is best for some!

The film is aided by consistent touches which show that it does not take itself too seriously: Ernest Cossart as the butler is every bit as much Marshall's friend as his servant. Strictly speaking, he remains very proper ("very good sir"), but his familiarity with his master and his decidedly knowing character make his conduct seem almost as if he is mocking propriety itself. Another help is Marshall's ability to effortlessly play the sophisticate, a man who never says anything wrong and who you are likely to find wearing a bow tie, even under his robe. This is a slice of the upper crust, but here, etiquette is matched by personality.