Directed by Harold S. Bucquet, usually working on sentimental films at MGM, and this is one of those films.A pig headed by the book executive, C.B. Beamis (Gene Lockhart),has a rule that none of the employees can be married to one another. So when Margy (Lana Turner) and William (John Shelton) fall in love and marry and Beamis finds out, he fires them both.Soon they are expecting their first child, but William cannot get work anywhere. Instead he depends on relief. Three months into being on the dole he just picks up a shovel and starts digging. When the digging crew protests and the boss man protests, William just says that he is tired of feeling useless, just being fed and housed by the government and not part of society. He's so sick he'll work for free. The boss man gets a policeman and William is in jail for criminal trespass and a bunch of other minor charges, but still he is separated from his extremely pregnant wife who has no idea where he is.Will this all work out? Of course it will! It's a Harold Bucquet film in the MGM tradition! Watch and find out how.Lockhart is great as the pig headed irascible boss, John Shelton is good as the optimistic guy who quickly loses that optimism, and Lana Turner is almost too sweet and understanding as the wife. I can say that the film was not exactly timely. By 1940 the Great Depression was pretty much over and this might have packed a more meaningful punch had it come out about three years before. Its message about cooperation, basically "It Takes A Village 1940 Style" was rather timely considering WWII was just a year away.

0001During the 1930s and into the 40s, MGM generally tried to paint a very rosy picture during the Depression. Additionally, Louis B. Mayer himself (the head of the studio) worked very hard to defeat the leftist, Upton Sinclair, during his attempt to win an election. Why? Because Mayer was dreadfully afraid of communism and socialism and fought hard to nip it in the bud. In light of this, how could a film like "We Who Are Young" get made? Could Mayer have missed this one? Surely he must, as it's progressive message clearly is NOT what 'Uncle' Louis wanted America to see!The plot of "We Who Are Young" is a lot like "The Crowd" and "Saturday's Children". The films are all about nice young folks who marry and try to grab a part of the American Dream but end up getting royally screwed. Again and again, things in the system seem to conspire against the couple as they try to just get by. At least that is the first 80% of the film--a strong Progressive message from the era...surprisingly strong. Unfortunately for the film, but perhaps fortunate for Mayer and his sentiments, the picture loses its way towards the end and degenerates too much towards sentimentality and lacks the hard edge you find in these other films. Overall, worth seeing but it just misses the mark. And, interestingly, although this is a Lana Turner starring vehicle, her co-star, John Shelton easily outshines her as the beleaguered husband.021

Dalton Trumbo, who wrote the script for this film, was one of the screenwriters blacklisted as a result of the Communist scare of the late 1940s and early 1950s. If you watch the movie with that in mind, you'll find fascinating the political sentiments he puts in the mouth of the protagonist (Shelton).It's not that the philosophy is Marxist, exactly, but it is certainly a left-wing view of working life. Shelton's antagonist, Bemis, expresses a very pure libertarian view--he got where he is though his own efforts alone, he never asked anyone for help, nor got help from any, and he's damn proud of it. He has contempt for "weaklings" who don't match his self-sufficiency.Shelton--Trumbo, that is--calls him out. He says that no one has ever done anything alone, he's always had help from the others around him and that people depend on each other for support and there's nothing wrong with that. Rules may be rules, but they must be administered with human kindness.We're still having the very same argument today, in almost the same words. I've found myself having identical discussions on Facebook and Reddit, and the libertarian view is alive and well. Interestingly, Trumbo makes some of the same points I have made in these discussions.Anyhow, there's a non-obvious deeper layer to this film that makes it interesting in today's political environment. It's worth seeing for that reason, if for no other.

John Shelton and Lana Turner star are "We Who Are Young," a 1940 film also starring Gene Lockhart. Turner and Shelton are newlyweds who work in the same office; she's fired as soon as the boss (Lockhart) finds out. Married women can't work there; it seems they're taking the jobs away from the more deserving men, and after all, a husband should be able to support his wife. I don't know about the work rule, but it was the prevailing attitude that if your wife worked, you couldn't support her. The couple has trouble meeting their furniture payments, so hubby takes a loan. When he can't make those payments, his salary his attached. His boss fires him for that; you can't be an upstanding citizen if your salary is attached. Meanwhile, his out of work wife becomes pregnant, the furniture is gone, his job is gone, and he can't find another one.On one hand, it shows you how times have changed in the workplace for the better at least as far as employment laws; on the other hand, at least the Lockhart character has qualms of conscience, which no employer in this day and age would have. Firing at Christmas doesn't bother them, nor does firing someone without notice and having security escort them out, lest they steal a paper clip, nor does spending $250,000 to have their offices redecorated, only to tell employees there's no money for even a cost of living raise.John Shelton chews up the scenery as the husband. He's not particularly good, and though she doesn't get to emote like Shelton, MGM decided Lana Turner was going to be a star. She's very sweet, beautiful and fragile appearing here. Shelton I guess went into the service and lost what little grooming the studio was giving him. It looks like he quit show business in 1953.Extremely dated, not great, interesting for Turner and a look at the workplace in the 1939-41 era.