My American Wife (1936) User Reviews (2)

In Love With America

[boblipton · 6/10 · 12 December 2023]

Ann Southern has married very noble Hungarian Fracis Lederer. This pleases everyone in her home town in Arizona, except for her grandfather, Fred Stone. He fought Indians to claim the land, and he and his family are wealthy. What he's proudest of is being American. So he's not impressed by Lederer, who claims to love his wife, but is even more in love with America. But even as he comes to win Stone around, the rest of the family grows more disturbed by the fact that the eclat of his background seems out of step with the rest of them, and gradually, Miss Sothern.

It's more of a drama than a straight-up comedy, which you would not expect from some of the names in the cast, including Billie Burke as Miss Sothern's mother. However, although she had a sure hand as a snobbish but good-hearted nitwit, it's fascinating to watch her move to the other side of amusement into a character whose lack of understanding extends to important issues. Lederer, alas, is off a bit in tone, and the stuffiness and wrong-headed family makes this occasionally unpleasant rather than raising sympathy. But Stone is a delight.

She too will find her man Godfrey, but in the oddest of situations.

[mark.waltz · 4/10 · 20 July 2018]

When a wealthy family patriarch (Fred Stone) is honored, his offspring look up to him with the highest of respect. That is until he begins to influence the newest member of the family, Count Francis Lederer, the new husband of spoiled granddaughter Ann Sothern. Moving onto Stone's ranch along with Sothern and his sons Grant Mitchell, Sidney Toler and Hal K. Dawson (and assorted in-laws and grandchildren), Lederer finds himself hired for a merely titular position in the family firm. But using his influence in local society and his wife's money, Lederer creates deals that could cost the family their fortune and dignity, all due to Stone's influence on his new grandson-in-law. This creates tensions in the new marriage, already having them because of family interference and their nuevo riche snootiness. and Lederer suddenly announces that he is dissolving the marriage.

This screwball comedy could have worked based on the differences between cultures, generations and morals, and the European desire to embrace anything all American. But all American doesn't flow into the business world, especially if it affects the family coffers, and Lederer's realization that patriarch Stone embarrasses his children disgusts him, as he finds more in common with the no-nonsense retired cowboy than his own wife or other snooty in-laws. It's amusing to see Lederer lighten up as he takes on certain personal traits that Stone shows him, poo-poo'ing father-in-law Mitchell's constant attempts to dominate his life, and eventually getting a ranch of his own. What could have been an amusing look at the conflicts presented here becomes a mixed reaction to an often shallow screenplay that doesn't make all the pieces fit comfortably together. Sothern's character doesn't have much depth, and that leaves it to Stone and Lederer to get the best parts. Then of course there's Billie Burke in one of her A typical dizzy matrons as Sothern's mother.