Three Blind Mice *** (1938, Loretta Young, Joel McCrea, David Niven, Stuart Erwin, Marjorie Weaver, Pauline Moore, Binnie Barnes, Jane Darwell) – Classic Movie Review 11,359

Three Blind Mice (1938): ‘THREE LITTLE LOVEIES so eager to meet Life….Love…and a Man With A Million Dollars!’

Director William A Seiter’s 1938 20th Century Fox American black and white film Three Blind Mice is a light, fairly sparkling romantic comedy based on the oft-seen pattern of three Kansas small-town-girl sisters, Pamela, Moira and Elizabeth Charters (Loretta Young, Marjorie Weaver, Pauline Moore), who come to the big city in California in search of wealthy husbands.

As part of their plan, Young masquerades as a wealthy woman socialite with Weaver and Moore as her helper staff. Joel McCrea, David Niven and Stuart Erwin play the men in the story. The practised playing and Seiter’s zesty handling help a lot.

Three Blind Mice is based on the play The Greeks Had a Word for It by Zoë Atkins and Stephen Powys, first filmed as The Greeks Had a Word for Them in 1932 and remade as the Technicolor musical Moon over Miami in 1941 with Betty Grable, Don Ameche and Carole Landis, and again as How To Marry a Millionaire in 1953. The character and plot are similar in Three Little Girls in Blue (1946).

Also in the cast are Binnie Barnes, Jane Darwell, Leonid Kinskey, Spencer Charters, Elisha Cook Jr, Franklin Pangborn, Herbert Heywood, Antonio Filauri, Ben Hendricks Jr, Alex Pollard, Lillian Porter, and Iva Stewart.

It was shown in a double bill with Woman Against Woman in June 1938.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,359

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