DEATH TAKES A HOLIDAY (1934)

The first half of this movie and the last few minutes are quite good, but most of the middle is deadly dull, making this not quite the classic that its reputation would suggest. It's based on a play, though it works best when it's opened up beyond its stagy and melodramatic roots. Sir Guy Standing is a duke who is holding a weekend house party for a visiting dignitary, Prince Sirki; as the film opens, the prince hasn't arrived yet and two cars full of arriving guests, racing their way through the night, feel a mysterious shadow pass over them just before an accident in which, miraculously, no one is hurt. Later, in the best scene in the film, Death, as a dark-robed Grim Reaper figure, visits the Duke. As the title suggests, Death has decided to take a holiday among the living to find out why he is so feared. Prince Sirki has died and Death takes his form (Fredric March). He is appropriately ill at ease at first in human interaction, but soon warms to the guests, especially Grazia (Evelyn Venable). Two other women, Katharine Alexander and Gail Patrick, set their sights on the prince, but it is Venable who is mesmerized by him without understanding why. At the end of his holiday, the question is, will March take Venable with him as he returns to the infinite. The sets are beautiful and the photography is striking, especially in the first half hour when shadows are used quite well. The romance plot feels like DRACULA in mood, with the death-obsessed woman fascinated by a charming but deadly male. The special effects used for Death's first appearance are great, making Death a paradoxical figure of both dark solidity and transparency. Henry Travers, more famous as the supernatural Clarence in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE, plays a house guest. Kent Taylor plays Venable's boyfriend, who really doesn't stand much of a chance against the mysterious prince. Despite the doldrums of the middle, the film is worth seeing, and is available (though currently out of print) on DVD in a package with the recent Brad Pitt remake, MEET JOE BLACK.