Classic 40s Movie: “Here Comes Mr. Jordan”

September is Classic 40s Movie month. Today’s guest post comes from Wayne Kline.

Movie Title: Here Comes Mr. Jordan

Year: 1941

Writers: Two Oscar wins for Best Writing! Harry Segall won the Academy Award for Best Writing, Original Story based on his play “Heaven Can Wait”. And Sidney Buchman and Seton I. Miller won for Best Writing, Screenplay.

Lead Actors: Robert Montgomery as Joe Pendleton, a flying-sax-playing boxer taken too soon who wants his shot at the title. Actually, he plays three roles for he becomes a tycoon killed twice by his cheating wife and her lover. And then a gambler shot by crooks. He was nominated for Oscar as Best Actor.
James Gleason as Pop Corkle, the boxer’s befuddled manager who cremates too fast. He was nominated for Oscar as Best Supporting Actor.

Edward Everett Horton as Messenger 7213. A nervous angel who called in a soul too soon and can’t correct the mistake because the body has been cremated.

Claude Rains as Mr. Jordan, the well-mannered heavenly supervisor who vows to make it right by getting the boxer a new body he’ll be happy with.

Evelyn Keyes, the beautiful young woman who must clear her father’s good name after tycoon framed him for financial misdoing.

Rita Johnson as a cheating wife who wants to murder her rich husband.

Director: Alexander Hall. He also directed the movie’s 1947 sequel DOWN TO EARTH.

Trivia. Alexander Hall was once engaged to Lucille Ball. Lucy dumped him for Desi Arnaz. But later together they hired him to direct their 1957 big-screen visiting angel comedy Forever, Darling.

Something to think about: if Lucille Ball had married Mr. Hall, she’d be Lucille Ball-Hall.

Plot Summary: A prizefighter who died before his time is reincarnated as a tycoon with a murderous wife. He’s given a new body. But he must choose between getting his shot at a title and helping a young woman clear the name of her father.

Why I Think This Is A Classic 40s Movie

Whimsical fantasy is my favorite genre, especially when it’s done as well as this one.

Why it’s a classic? First, look at all the Oscar recognition. It won two Academy Awards for Best Story and Screenplay. It was also nominated for Best Picture, Actor, Supporting Actor, Director and Cinematography.

If ever there was a decade when you needed some whimsical fantasy, it was the decade of WWII. The premise of this fantasy is a guy dies 50 years too soon due to a big mistake. That resonated with the big fear of the times. This movie came out in August, 1941. While Pearl Harbor was 5 months away, everyone knew the U.S.A. could not escape the war that had darkened Europe and Asia for years. America was getting ready. Since September 16, 1940, men from 18 to 34 were being drafted. In China with the Flying Tigers and in England with the Eagle Squadron, U.S. volunteer pilots were already flying and dying. Americans were anxious about loved ones. Thus their fascination with destiny and angels and souls.

This influential vision was influenced movies to follow.

Just as TOPPER in 1937 begat a spate of ghost movies such as THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR, this 1941 movie spawned guardian angel movies.

I MARRIED AN ANGEL (1942)
ANGEL ON MY SHOULDER (1946) (in which Claude Rains plays the Devil)
ANGELS IN THE OUTFIELD (1951)
A GUY NAMED JOE (1943)
THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT (1945)
HEAVEN ONLY KNOWS (1947)
THE BISHOP’S WIFE (1947)

Not to mention IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946).

The movie itself had a sequel DOWN TO EARTH (1947) directed by Alexander Hall and starring Rita Hayworth. Different actor played Mr. Jordan.

HERE COMES MR. JORDAN was itself remade as HEAVEN CAN WAIT (1978), starring Warren Beatty, Buck Henry and Julie Christie.

DOWN TO EARTH (2001) starred Chris Rock.

There even was a Bollywood remake JHUK GAYA AASMAN (English: THE SKIES HAVE BOWED) (1968).

My Favorite Moment In The Movie

It’s a visual moment. When they are walking with fog at their knees to a glowing white plane in fluffy cloud heaven. It seems like a wonderful fun place where angels didn’t have wings. They wore business suits. And although they were part of a vast bureaucracy prone to error, it was beautiful.

This is one of the first movie to take us to fluffy cloud heaven.

My Favorite Dialogue In the Movie

Many funny lines play lightly off the absurd situations as such trying to find a suitable boxer’s body. “I don’t want anybody’s body. I want my body!”

But my favorite line is at the end when Mr. Jordan arranges for Pendleton to forget his past and assures his charge:

“Remember I said you wouldn’t be cheated. Nobody is really. Eventually, all things work out. You were meant to be champion. You are… You are back on your own road. Don’t worry, Joe. You’ll have everything you were ordained for. This is your road, Joe.”

Inspiring words for us all!

Key Things You Should Look For When Watching This Movie

Look for a young Lloyd Bridges.

Look for silly plot situations that progress fast and are put together so seamlessly.

Look for Robert Montgomery, an under-appreciated actor.

He won Oscar as Best Actor as a psycho killer in NIGHT MUST FALL (1937). In this movie, he’s totally different in light comedy role.

Robert Montgomery’s daughter Elizabeth Montgomery was probably more famous for her fantasy role as star of TV’s Bewitched.

Robert and Elizabeth differed in their politics. Robert was a Republican. Elizabeth, a Democrat. But father and daughter shared a courage and integrity in not blindly following the party line when it was wrong. Elizabeth opposed the Vietnam War of President Johnson.

And in the leadup to World War II, Republicans were quite isolationist but Robert kept up with situation in Europe through British actor friends and along with Jimmy Stewart, campaigned for involvement. Montgomery was among the first in Hollywood to volunteer. In 1939, he drove ambulances in France until the Dunkirk evacuation. In December 1941, he joined the U.S. Navy and rose to rank of Lt. Commander. He served on a destroyer in the D-Day invasion.

Thanks, Wayne! To show our gratitude for your guest post, here’s a dash of creative juju for you. Whoosh!

We already have a set of classic 50s movies, 60s Movies, 70s movies, 80s Movies and 90s Movies. This month, we’re working on 40s movies. And thanks to the GITS community, we’ve got 30 movies in the works, one for each day of the month!

Those who I put in bold have already sent me their posts. If you haven’t sent yours to me, please do so as soon as you can!!!

Act of Violence — Eric Rodriguez
Arsenic and Old Lace — Gisela Wehrl
Bicycle Thieves — Megaen Kelly
Brief Encounter — Emily Bonkoski
Casablanca — Paul Graunke
Double Indemnity — Susan Winchell
Five Graves to Cairo — Jeff Gibson
Foreign Correspondent — Doc Kane
Here Comes Mr. Jordan — Wayne Kline
His Girl Friday — John Henderson
It’s a Wonderful Life — David Laudenslager
Kind Hearts and Coronets — James Calder
Key Largo — Will King
Laura — Melinda Mahaffey Icden
Les enfants du paradis — Brendan Howley
Mrs. Miniver — Traci Nell Peterson
Notorious — Christine Henton
Now Voyager — Melissa Privette
Out of the Past — Brantley Aufill
Rope — Lance Morgan
The Bank Dick — Bob Saenz
The Best Years of Their Lives — Shaun Parker
The Big Sleep — Ipsita Barik
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir — Annie Wood
The Long Voyage Home — Vincent Martini
The Lost Weekend — Liz Warner
The Maltese Falcon — Roy Gordon
The Ox-Bow Incident — Clay Mitchell
The Philadelphia Story — Kristen Demaline
The Sin of Harold Diddlebock — David Joyner
The Third Man — Harry Cooke
To Have and Have Not — Felicity Flesher

Thanks to everyone who steps up for this ongoing project!

For the original post explaining the series, go here.

For all of the 40s movies featured in the series, go here.

Click REPLY and see you in comments about today’s classic 40s movie!