Big Brown Eyes

Big Brown Eyes
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Raoul Walsh
Screenplay by	Bert Hanlon Raoul Walsh
Based on	"Hahsit Babe" "Big Brown Eyes" 1935 Liberty magazine stories by James Edward Grant
Produced by	Walter Wanger
Starring	Cary Grant Joan Bennett Walter Pidgeon
Cinematography	George T. Clemens
Edited by	Robert L. Simpson
Music by	Gerard Carbonara
Production company	Walter Wanger Productions
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date	April 3, 1936 (1936-04-03)
Running time	77 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$289,696[1]
Box office	$359,009[1]

Big Brown Eyes is a 1936 American romantic comedy crime film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Cary Grant, Joan Bennett and Walter Pidgeon.[2] It was produced by Walter Wanger and distributed by Paramount Pictures.

Plot

Police officer Danny Barr is chasing jewel robbers. His girlfriend, Eve Fallon, is initially working as a manicurist, but quickly takes a job as a reporter assisting in the effort against the jewel thieves. Fallon and Barr become disgusted when one jewel gang member is acquitted after killing a baby in Central Park, and both leave their jobs. Soon thereafter, Fallon gets a lucky break while giving a manicure and the case is solved.

Cast

• Cary Grant as Det. Sgt. Danny Barr
• Joan Bennett as Eve Fallon
• Walter Pidgeon as Richard Morey
• Lloyd Nolan as Russ Cortig
• Alan Baxter as Cary Butler
• Marjorie Gateson as Mrs. Chesley Cole
• Isabel Jewell as Bessie Blair
• Douglas Fowley as Benjamin 'Benny' Battle
• Henry Brandon as Don Butler
• Joe Sawyer as Jack Scully

Reception

The film recorded a loss of $14,645.[1] Critics have regarded it as "disposable"[3] and "inconsequential"[4] with "shoddy writing and generally uninspired performances."[5]

Writing for The Spectator in 1936, Graham Greene gave the film a positive review, characterizing it as "a fast well-directed and quite unsentimental gangster film, pleasantly free from emotion".[6]

More recent writers have been kinder to the film. Grant biographer Scott Eyman called it an "unheralded gem in Grant's catalogue, a snappy comedy-drama [...] a cheerfully disreputable pre-Code film unaccountably made after the Code, with speedy cross-talk that prefigures His Girl Friday."[7] Writing for The New Yorker, Richard Brody hailed the film's "cocksure grifters and workaday wiseacres who dish out sharp-edged patter—none more than Grant and Bennett, whose gibing often resembles quasi-Beckettian doubletalk. Here, Grant offers early flashes of the brash, suave, and intricate antics on which his enduring comedic persona is based."[8]

References

1. Bernstein, Matthew (1994). Walter Wagner: Hollywood Independent. University of California Press. p. 436. ISBN 978-0520081277.
2. Brody, Richard (February 10, 2015). "Movie of the Week: "Big Brown Eyes"". The New Yorker. Retrieved May 16, 2017.
3. Vineyard, David L. (August 8, 2009). "A Movie Review". mysteryfile.com. Retrieved May 16, 2017.
4. Kellow, Brian (November 26, 2004). The Bennetts: An Acting Family. University Press of Kentucky. p. 205. ISBN 0813123291.
5. N., F.S. (May 2, 1936). "At the Capitol". The New York Times. Retrieved May 16, 2017.
6. Greene, Graham (June 19, 1936). "Dangerous/Big Brown Eyes". The Spectator. (reprinted in: John Russel, Taylor, ed. (1980). The Pleasure Dome. Oxford University Press. pp. 82. ISBN 0192812866.)
7. Eyman, Scott (2020). Cary Grant: A Brilliant Disguise. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-1501192111.
8. "Big Brown Eyes". The New Yorker.

External links

• Big Brown Eyes at IMDb