This has to be one of the few Monogram releases I've reviewed and that's only because Kay Francis rounded out her career on Poverty Row. Francis is an actress I've heard described in glowing, nay, reverential terms all my life but seldom, if ever, seen on screen. I came close when I saw - and loved - the remake, with George Brent and Merle Oberon, of the Kay Francis/William Powell bittersweet One-Way Passage. From what I've read she was, during the thirties, Warners top actress but then they cut her loose and she struck a deal to produce and star in three movies at Monogram after which she rode into the sunset. Allotment Wives is the only one of the three I've seen and she is, apparently, cast against type as a heavy, the honcho of a ring of scammers who use a USO type club to set servicemen up with women prepared to marry them and then claim their allotment. Paul Kelly is tapped to break up the racket and it all ends in tears with Francis getting one of the all-time great last lines on celluloid; 'nice shooting' she says to the guy who has just placed a slug where it will do the most good. Class to the end.
Review of Allotment Wives
