Directed by:
Mitchell LeisenCinematography:
Ted TetzlaffCast:
Carole Lombard, Fred MacMurray, Ralph Bellamy, Astrid Allwyn, Ruth Donnelly, Marie Prevost, William Demarest, Herman Bing, Bess Flowers, Harold Miller, Sam Ash (more)Plots(1)
New York hotel manicurist Regi Allen comes from poverty and has resolved to marry a rich man. She doesn’t realise that her best customer, a millionaire in a wheelchair, has developed feelings for her. Instead, she hooks up with Ted, the happy-go-lucky scion of a family that lost all its money in the stock market crash. Although he confesses to her that he needs to marry for money and is engaged to the daughter of a wealthy industrialist, Regi allows the spoiled layabout to take up residence on her living room sofa. While Ted’s fiancée sees in Regi an unwelcome rival, the manicurist’s rich customer considers proposing marriage … Hands Across the Table was made under Paramount’s newly-installed head of production, Ernst Lubitsch. Director Mitchell Leisen imbued his comedy with chiaroscuro lighting and a pronounced sense of contrast in social status. Carole Lombard, appearing as a brunette this time, also brings a note of darkness to her character, in keeping with the ambiguity of her tomboy mien. Sporting a given name that sounds male, and a full-time job, Regi is endowed with male characteristics from the start, while the actual man presents as a mama’s boy ensconced on the sofa. (Berlinale)
(more)Cast
Carole Lombard
USA
Best movies:
To Be or Not to Be (1942)
Zelig (1983) - a.f.
My Man Godfrey (1936)
Fred MacMurray
USA
Best movies:
Bon Voyage! (1962)
Double Indemnity (1944)
The Apartment (1960)
Ralph Bellamy
USA
Best movies:
Rosemary's Baby (1968)
Trading Places (1983)
One Man Mutiny (1955)
Astrid Allwyn
USA
Best movies:
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
Love Affair (1939)
Follow the Fleet (1936)
Ruth Donnelly
USA
Best movies:
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The Bells of St. Mary's (1945)
Marie Prevost
Canada
Best movies:
Nana (1926)
The Marriage Circle (1924)
Ladies of Leisure (1930)
William Demarest
USA
Best movies:
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
The Mountain (1956)
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963)
Herman Bing
German Empire
Best movies:
Sunrise (1927)
Dumbo (1941)
Broadway Melody of 1940 (1940)
Bess Flowers
USA
Best movies:
Singin' in the Rain (1952)
Rear Window (1954)
Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
Harold Miller
USA
Best movies:
Song of Love (1947)
Sunset Boulevard (1950)
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
Sam Ash
USA
Best movies:
It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Ralph Brooks
USA
Best movies:
Love Crazy (1941)
After the Thin Man (1936)
Monsieur Verdoux (1947)
Albert Conti
Austria-Hungary
Best movies:
Freaks (1932)
The Crusades (1935)
Conquest (1937)
Edward Peil Sr.
USA
Best movies:
Love Crazy (1941)
Captains Courageous (1937)
Storm Warning (1951)
Ferdinand Munier
USA
Best movies:
It Started with Eve (1941)
Midnight (1939)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)
Fred Toones
USA
Best movies:
I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932)
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
Dodge City (1939)
Murray Alper
USA
Best movies:
The Roaring Twenties (1939)
After the Thin Man (1936)
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)
Nelson McDowell
USA
Best movies:
The Plainsman (1936)
The Texas Rangers (1936)
The Lost World (1925)
Edward Gargan
USA
Best movies:
The Thin Man Goes Home (1945)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
You Gotta Stay Happy (1948)
Francis Sayles
USA
Best movies:
Citizen Kane (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
Union Pacific (1939)