Grand Dame, The (1931)
** (out of 4)
Weak one-reeler has Patsy Kelly playing a rich woman who is constantly laughed at in the press because she doesn't have any class. She's invited to a party where she's going to learn some but it turns out it's just a bunch of con artists trying to take advantage of her. As other reviewers have pointed out, this film pretty much starts and ends without much notion of what it was trying to do. I'm going to guess that the studio just wanted to introduce Kelly, in her film debut, to people but it looks like they would have selected some better material. I was really shocked to see how little actually happens in this film. We meet Kelly, she goes to the party and then it's over. The screenplay really doesn't set up any jokes except for a couple silly ones like Kelly accidentally squirting lemon juice in one of the crook's eye. Those expecting the loud Kelly that you'd see in later years will probably be disappointed because she's pretty low-key here and rather quiet. The film just doesn't have enough laughs to make it worth viewing unless you're a fan of Kelly and want to see where she started.