Our Blushing Brides is a 1930 pre-Code romantic comedy-drama film directed by Harry Beaumont, starring Joan Crawford, Robert Montgomery, Anita Page, Dorothy Sebastian, and Raymond Hackett.
Crawford, Page, and Sebastian are Gerry (for Geraldine), Connie, and Franky (for Francine), three single girls who share an apartment in New York City and work together at Jardine's Department Store. Connie and Franky are salesgirls while Gerry works as a "mannequin" showing off Jardine fashions for rich customers.
Gerry and Connie are in love with, respectively, Tony and David Jardine, the handsome young sons of the family that owns the store. Gerry is besotted with Tony Jardine (Montgomery), but he's a playboy, and Gerry is not interested in becoming a notch on his bedpost. Connie and David Jardine (Hackett) are dating. Franky, who is unapologetic about looking for a rich husband, appears to have found one in Marty Sanderson (John Miljan), a rich guy who strolls into the department store one day and spends $576 in 1930 money on blankets. Eventually Gerry gets engaged to David while Franky marries Marty, leaving Gerry the only one still working at the store after she fends off Tony's advances—but both David and Marty have secrets.
Tropes:
- Abhorrent Admirer: Joe, a loudmouthed but genial fellow with a round shape and beetle eyebrows who keeps pestering Gerry for dates.
- Busby Berkeley Number: Busby Berkeley himself didn't work on this movie, and in fact was just getting started in movies in 1930. But some of the shots during the fashion show, overhead shots of swimsuit-clad models symmetrically diving into a pool and bikini-clad models in a circle swooping around in their gowns, look like early versions of Busby Berkeley numbers.
- Celebrity Paradox: Gerry goes to a movie called Let Us Be Gay, which was a real movie that featured Hedda Hopper, who is also in this film.
- Fanservice: Many, many shots of Gerry and the other living mannequins at the department store getting into and out of their lingerie.
- Have a Gay Old Time: Gerry goes to the movies and sees Let Us Be Gay.
- Leg Focus: Franky is futzing with a run in her stocking, thus showing off her attractive legs, when she first meets Sanderson.
- Lohengrin and Mendelssohn: The Mendelssohn part (the wedding recessional) plays over the opening titles. Oddly, despite the fact the movie is called Our Blushing Brides and wedding music is played over the opening credits, no weddings are seen in the movie. Franky gets married off-screen.
- Match Cut: From a shot of one of the girls's punching her time card at the end of shift to one of the girls's hands opening a can of food.
- Snow Means Love: It's snowing on the ground and there's snow in the trees at the end, when Gerry and a reformed Tony return to the tree house after getting engaged.
- Spurned into Suicide: Sort of. Connie poisons herself after finding out that David isn't going to marry her, that she is actually The Mistress and David is engaged to some society lady.
- Thematic Series: Third in a series that included Our Dancing Daughters and Our Modern Maidens. Crawford and Page starred in all three while Sebastian appeared in the first and third. There's no continuity between the movies but they all deal with young flappers finding love in New York.
- Treehouse of Fun: How rich is Tony? His family's estate has a lake with an island in it. But really, how rich is Tony? The island features a large tree with a tree house. Seriously though, how rich is Tony? The tree house is actually a fully tricked-out apartment with electricity, a fireplace, phone service, and oh yeah, an electric ladder for climbing up.
