1890's Secret Agent Work


Undercover Robert Taylor Says, This Is My Affair (1937)

Naval officer Robert Taylor goes on secret assignment for President McKinley to flush out bank-robbing Victor McLaglen and Brian Donlevy. 20th Fox was lured by Gay 90's theme like bugs to a light bulb, Affair pursuing trend of The Bowery and ones that would follow right into the 50's when past century dwellers would disappear sure as nickel beer and horse carriages these pics celebrated. What was Betty Grable's career but ongoing evocation of this? Zanuck, or maybe Joseph Schenck, must have been raised by barber shop quartets. This time at least, action is played more for keeps, stakes high for Taylorgone undercover and then having rugs pulled when McKinley is assassinated and there's no one to clear him of complicity in bank jobs. This Is My Affair was bedecked in gloss, a bid to match Metro for such values, that a greater urgency as Taylor was borrowed from Leo for the occasion. Much of selling honed on lead lady Barbara Stanwyck, Bob's real-life inamorata. This Is My Affair turned up lately on TCM, licensed from Fox, and like many of 20th's, could use a remaster.

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