"The Sophomore," which the previous reviewer claims to have seen in its sound version, is a rarity by the great director Leo McCarey which has recently surfaced on YouTube in its silent version.It is a mildly amusing,at best cute, college comedy also of interest as a vehicle for the underrated, charming star Eddie Quillan. This version as it has been posted is missing the dice gambling scene, referred to by the previous user review and by the contemporary New York Times critic Mordaunt Hall,which explains why the sophomore of the title lost the funds with which to pay his tuition.Contrary to what the user review says, the Quillan character does not ask his mother for a loan; he is too proud, but the waitress in the soda shop where he tries to work covers for him, without telling him, borrowing in turn from her boss. There are some funny gags such as a distracting cat landing on the trail of the woman's gown Quillan goes on stage with for a school play, McCarey uses a similar gag later in one of his Bing Crosby religious films. This occurs in the first of the two extended comedy sequences. The use of drag by Quillan, who appears as the Princess in a corny medieval setting, is of historical curiosity, especially as the Quillan character later refers to himself disparagingly as "a powder puff" in an intertitle,and as we have seen him prancing about somewhat, for deliberate humorous effect, in the soda shop footage. In the second extended sequence he saves the day, but in a surprising way,when this clumsy, short, not especially athletic student is called upon to play in the football match finale. Let's hope the sound version also turns up, especially as there was a musical number in it, a song that the waitress, played by Sally O'Neill, croons to the sophomore.
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kidboots2 December 2015College movies were suddenly big news in the early talkie days, not only because a song or two could be added along the way but there was always room for some up to the minute slang and twenties talk, so it's unfortunate that the only surviving print of "The Sophomore" is a silent. So you miss out on "Little By Little", the hit song that the movie is remembered for. Sound equipment was expensive and even by 1929 some of the studios were not convinced talkies were here to stay so some films were made in both sound and silent versions so that local cinemas in small towns wouldn't miss out on the big hits. "The Sophomore" (from a "College Humor" story) introduced Pathe's roster of young hopefuls to talkies (Stanley Smith was a Pathe player even though he made more movies at Paramount, Eddie Quillan, Jeanette Loff) with veteran Sally O'Neill as the star.
Joe Collins (Quillan) is back from summer break and eager to resume his work as a soda jerk so he can start paying for his college tuition. Drug store manager Dan Willis (Brookes Benedict) is not keen to have him back as he has fallen for peppy waitress Margy (O'Neill) and thinks Joe will cramp his style. Surprisingly Smith, who seemed to corner the "sappy guy who says it with a song" movie persona, here plays the deadly "college hero" Tom Weck, an egotistical chap who didn't like the way Joe spoke to his girl, the fair Barbara (beautiful Jeanette Loff) and wants to cut him down to size!! He gets his chance at the college dance - Joe brings Margy and together they duet "Little By Little" (although you can't hear it)!! But Margy is given the cold shoulder by the snooty fraternity snobs for being "only a waitress actually"!! and mean Tom decides to secretly move the dance to teach Joe a lesson!!
Makes you wonder just how much of the movie was cut - Jeanette Loff didn't appear again but she seemed to make her Barbara a very sympathetic character. Joe has other problems - by losing his job he is now in danger of being kicked out of college because of unpaid fees but suddenly money is sent to him "with love from Mother" - if mother had the money why was Joe working his heart out trying to pay his way through college, I suspect there was a reel missing at the start that explained Joe's predicament!! Anyway Joe doesn't question or seem concerned that the money came from his mother - but it didn't!! Margy borrowed the money from Dan who now insists on special attention connected with his status as her new "best friend"!! When he realises that his loan has gone to help Joe, he sacks Margy who then seeks sympathy from Joe in his college digs!! A big no-no, Joe tries to hide her but Tom finds out and banishes Joe from the fraternity. That finds Margy out on her own (until the final clinch) as Joe gives her the "I didn't think you were that type of girl" speech!!
There is of course the big game - rah! rah!, when Joe's mother comes along and all is soon revealed. Stuart Erwin plays the part of a goofy announcer and Lew Ayres can be seen as one of the sorority boys!! -
F Gwynplaine MacIntyre13 February 2003Like quite a few other films which someone has described on the IMDb site as 'lost', 'The Sophomore' is very much among the living. I attended a public screening of this film at the American Museum of the Moving Image, on the site of Paramount's old Astoria Studio.
Despite its title, 'The Sophomore' is not a sequel to Harold Lloyd's film 'The Freshman'. But this movie is directed by the great Leo McCarey, so it automatically merits some attention ... and there are indeed some good scenes here. Eddie Quillan plays Joe, a clean-cut young man who enrols in Hanford College ... ostensibly to get an education. He asks his poor old widowed mother to scrape up the money for his college tuition, which is Strike One against this film's attempt to depict Joe sympathetically. As soon as he arrives on campus, Joe blows all his tuition money in a gambling scheme: that's Strike Two against this movie. Strike Three arrives when we realise that this is one more 'college' movie in which the only important activities are The Big Game and The Big Dance. None of these college students ever seem to care about going to class or getting an education.
After Joe loses all his money, he has to work his way through college ... which he should have done in the first place, instead of cadging from his poor old mother. He gets a job as a soda jerk in the local tuck-shop where the Hanford students hang out. Also employed there is sweet young co-ed Margie (the pretty Sally O'Neil) who is likewise working her way through college.
'The Sophomore' was released in silent and talking versions. The talkie version features a scene in which Sally O'Neil sings a song to Eddie Quillan: the song is called 'Little by Little', and I think it was written for this movie. It's a bouncy little tune, which I still hear on the radio every so often. Unfortunately, Sally O'Neil had a poor singing voice, and the sequence is filmed in a very static manner ... probably due to the unwieldy "blimped" cameras of the time. The silent version of this movie has better camera-work.
When the so-called 'college students' in this movie aren't involved in The Big Game or The Big Dance, the only thing that matters is The Big Show. Our lad Joe (classes? what classes?) joins the amateur theatricals, and he goes onstage in female costume. This college is co-ed, so why are the female roles played by male students? I found these scenes awkward, unfunny and unpleasant. Eddie Quillan should not have been allowed to wear drag on screen. He was a short and slightly-built actor with extremely delicate features, who looked somewhat girlish in male roles. Here in 'The Sophomore', when he dresses up as a girl to play a female role onstage, he calls attention to his own genuinely girlish appearance ... yet at the same time he doesn't actually pass as a girl. It's not pretty, folks.
But this is a college movie, so of course the climax of the film is The Big Game: a football match against rival college Colton. Our girl Joe ... I mean our lad Joe is too small to be a starter on the football team, but of course he ends up going into the game at the last minute. Does he win the game? I have to give Leo McCarey some credit. All through this college-based movie, McCarey manages to embrace all the rah-rah clichés of the genre ... and then at the very end of the movie he pulls a surprise. I shan't spoil it for you. But 'The Sophomore' isn't an especially good film, in either its silent or its talkie version. I'm a McCarey fan, so it pains me to rate this movie only 4 points out of 10.