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It Happened One Night (1934)

Clark Gable felt a little grumpy when he was approached to take the leading role in “It Happened One Night.” He didn’t think it was a very good story. Claudette Colbert only took the part because it was only going to take two weeks to film, and she was heading off on vacation. What started out as a half-hearted attempt by both actors turned into the vehicle that would win each of them their only Academy Awards.

Gable is Peter Warne, a newspaper reporter who hasn’t had a good story for a long time. At odds with his editor, he doesn’t know what he’s going to do for work. He gets on a bus to discover that his seatmate is none other than Ellie Andrews, the only daughter of a millionaire, who eloped with her fiancé and was then spirited away by her father. Escaping her father, she’s now back to New York and the arms of her husband, but she must do it without attracting the attention of the press, or her father will swoop down on her again.

She doesn’t know Peter is a journalist. She only knows that she needs his help to get to New York. He tells her what he does for a living and offers to see her safely to her husband if she’ll give him the exclusive story of her flight to freedom.

Along the way, they find themselves hopelessly attracted to each other, but she is a married woman, after all, and he does have his standards. Her flighty helplessness appeals to his confident nature, and he enjoys taking care of her, even if he is spending a lot more emotional energy on the project than he had intended.

Perhaps the most famous scene in the movie is when Peter decides to teach Ellie how to hitchhike. He has a theory for the best way to hold his thumb in the air, but has no success. She, on the other hand, gets a car to stop immediately, by standing on the side of the road and showing a little leg. Worked like a charm.

This movie is a delight, and you should definitely add it to your “must see” list, if it’s not already a favorite.

This film was not rated.

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