Rationing (1944) User Reviews (6)

Dated, but very funny

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 17 August 2013]

MGM teamed Wallace Beery and Marjorie Main for a nice if dated comedy about Rationing during the World War II home front years. The two are bitter enemies since the first war when fate kept them apart. But now they have a son and daughter respectively who are taking up where the parents might have left off.

First and foremost the film is about Rationing and in her local town Marjorie Main is the head of the Office Of Price Administration Board and Beery is a grocery store owner drowning in forms and regulations concerning what and how much he can sell to his customers. When I say that the film is dated I mean that a lot of the jokes about the color codes and ration points would not be gotten at all by today's audience. Even with that Beery's and Main's comedy is still eternal.

The Truman administration wanted to keep the Office of Price Administration around post war. But the demands of the public who was fed up with what you see in Rationing forced them to dissolve the OPA before they wished to.

Rationing also marked the farewell appearance of Gloria Dickson who died way too young and tragically in a fire. She plays the lady barber and local femme fatale of the town. Beery has a hysterically funny scene trying to retrieve a rationed girdle that fell in her hands.

Rationing though its inside humor is lost, still is a very funny film showing Beery and Main to their best advantage.

New York Times review of 1944

[saud-2 · 5/10 · 17 August 2013]

If all the jokes about the OPA were to be compiled and indexed, say by the Office of Facts and Figures, the resultant volume would no doubt outclass the Joe Miller anthology in size, if not in quality. In such a project the researchers could save a lot of effort by consulting Metro's latest Wallace Beery comedy, "Rationing." It should not be too surprising that the Globe's week-end arrival is no side-splitter, for, after all, there have been all too few really humorous sayings among the countless quips inspired by price ceilings, points, tokens, etc.

As a small-town butcher and general-store keeper Mr. Beery gets properly confused and exasperated when his icebox is empty and the rationing board, apparently unaware of the paper shortage, swamps him with application blanks and report forms. Of course, his lot is doubly troublesome, for Marjorie Main is the ration administrator, and she also has a personal 1-A priority on the hapless Mr. Beery as a matrimonial prospect. As long as the writers stick to retelling old OPA jokes, things are not too bad, for Mr. Beery can bring into play all of his elephantine grousings in a way that almost makes one forgive, if not forget, the staleness of the script.

But somebody had to spoil the fun by dragging in the black market and then having the garrulous Mr. B. smash it single-handedly in one of the most fantastic slugfests that have been put on the screen since 'way back when William Farnum and Milton Sills had it out in "The Spoilers." This one-man blitzkrieg should, however, endear Mr. Beery anew to the small-fry. As you probably have gathered by now, "Rationing" is Mr. Beery's picture—nobody else could get away with the things he is called upon to do and still hold an audience. Marjorie Main gives a good performance as usual, while young love is conventionally represented by Dorothy Morris and Tommy Batten.

A Dull Production

[boblipton · 6/10 · 17 August 2013]

Wallace Beery stars in this World War Two comedy programmer from MGM. It sort of starts out like W.C. Fields' IT'S A GIFT and continues on using Beery's aw-shucks blowhard dealing with the problems of the home front during World War Two: rationing and Marjorie Main.

The movie is carried on Beery's charm, which is considerable. Despite the MGM gloss and re-takes by Beery's THE CHAMP director, Norman Taurog, it's never more than good and may be too much for a modern viewer.

Aside from Beery, there isn't much star power here. The director is Willis Goldbeck, who never got that far out of the MGM shorts department before returning to writing -- for John Ford, which is not negligible. The producer is Orville Dull, surely not the most auspicious name for a producer, who mostly produced other programmers and sequels for MGM. He did win an Oscar for producing 1948s THE SECRET LAND, though.

Rationing?! What's that??

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 22 May 2019]

"Rationing" is a film that was very timely....back in 1944. However, many folks watching this movie today might be a bit confused as to what rationing was and why it was being done. Well, back during WWII, the US went 'total war'--and the entire economy went from a capitalist one to a government controlled economy. Soldiers and sailors needed food and weapons...and that meant telling the public that what items they wanted to purchase had to be slowly rationed out slowly...with priorities to the war effort. And who was in charge of monitoring and controlling civilian purchases? Local ration boards which oversaw and controlled consumption. As a result, many items were impossible or nearly impossible to get...such as new tires and some foods.

In "Rationing", Ben Barton (Wallace Beery) is a frustrated grocer. He cannot get tires, so he cannot make deliveries. At times, he cannot get meat, so customers stop using his store. So, he goes to the local representative of the rationing board, Iris Tuttle (Marjorie Main)...a woman who seems to go out of her way to make his life tougher!

Eventually, Ben is so frustrated that he goes to Wasington to see if he can get his friend, the Senator, to pull some strings and get him back in the military. Sure, Ben is an old guy...but he feels that he still can aid the war effort. So imagine his surprise when instead of going back to military service, he's appointed to the local rationing board instead! Now, Ben has all sorts of new problems to deal with...such as folks selling black market beef....and these crooks are more than willing to bribe or kill anyone who gets in their way!

I appreciate this film and how it's a nice window into America circa 1944. As a retired history teacher, I love any film that entertains AND gives a history lesson. And, as for the film itself, nearly all of Beery's films of the era were very entertaining and worth seeing. Overall, a propaganda film with a few nice laughs and entertaining throughout.

Thank Goodness they didn't ration comedy!

[mark.waltz · 6/10 · 7 January 2014]

In their most amusing appearance together, Wallace Beery and Marjorie Main are town rivals with a past who find their paths crossing more than either of them care to either admit or do without. This is exactly the type of film that Beery and his old sparing partner, Marie Dressler, had done as lovers in both "Min and Bill" and "Tugboat Annie", and even though he made more films with Ms. Main, he's more remembered for the two (plus a brief encounter in "Dinner at Eight") he made with Dressler than with Main. It's the middle of World War II, and small town store owner Beery finds himself at odds with ration supervisor Main. His ward is engaged to Main's daughter, and it comes as no shock to discover that the two elders had a romance many years before, separated by the first World War which resulted in marriages for each of them. His wife abandoned him and as Beery reminds Main, her husband did the same, "by dying". They are "the Bickersons" of Tuttlesville (and she seems to be an in-law of one of the founder's descendent's, her name being Iris Tuttle) and make waves for each other each chance they get-"In triplicate!".

In fact, "In triplicate!" could have been the name of this film, for each form Beery must fill out when Main begins to enforce rationing rules. Beery goes to Washington D.C. in order to find an army job just to get away from Main's interference in his business, but his old army buddy (Henry O'Neill), now a Senator, is intent on preventing that from happening, arranging for him to end up working with Main in Tuttlesville so he can get the goods on a meat-selling racket which has settled nearby. Comedy erupts into big volcano laughs when Main "rations" the selling of a girdle to the town sex-pot, and Beery must use a fishing rod to get it out of the vixen's home. The laughs dissipate a bit when Beery gets involved in the meat-selling racket, but they return for a ruckus finale where Main turns the tables on Beery in a surprisingly funny finale.

Some of the great character performers of the era have meaty parts here, including Connie Gilchrist, Donald Meek, Sarah Edwards and Chester Clute, and Gloria Dickson as the girdle-greedy sex kitten. The film manages to express the frustrations of the average American's inability to buy certain items without being preachy. As Beery tells one of his customers, selling excessive amounts of certain items would take it out of the mouths of soldiers off fighting the war, and this is certainly not a dated thought, even if rationing could certainly never succeed today. Only several generations after the end of the war (with our parents and grandparents sharing their own rationing stories with those of us who are interested, as well as their own remaining ration stamps), this reminds us of how America once took some sacrifices just so freedom could be fought for and won. And what's a little sacrifice considering the results of the end of that war and the enemies we managed to defeat?

pretty silly WW II film...

[ksf-2 · 7/10 · 24 May 2019]

WW II film about how people back home dealt with getting by on rationed supplies...gasoline, food, car and tire parts. Stars the seasoned hollywood pro Wallace Beery (Grand Hotel), Marjorie Main (The Women), and Donald Meek (almost EVERY film made in the 1930s, 1940s...) So many great, fun names. The typical war time propaganda film, showing folks how important it is to go along with the rules and regulations during war time, so food and supplies can go to the soldiers far away. Barton (Beery) is trying to run a general store, but the ration system is so complicated, he can't turn a profit, and none of the townspeople can afford to buy anything. and Iris (Main) is determined to enforce the rationing rules. Quite the snapshot in time, since we have so much of everything these days. hard to imagine a time when everything was in so short supply. a humorous storyline, but it's all based in reality. It's pretty good. clearly made for educational purposes. some lighter, funny lines that border on almost dirty, but mostly all good, clean fun. Directed by WIllis Goldbeck; he only directed eleven films, but wrote SO many screenplays, including some of the Doctor Kildares, and the Man Who shot Liberty Valence.