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Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert, Walter Connolly, Roscoe Karns, Jameson Thomas ... see more see more... , Alan Hale , Ernie S. Adams , Irving Bacon , Ward Bond , Harry C. Bradley , Charles D. Brown , James Burke , Douglas Carter Beane , Eddy Chandler , Wallis Clark , Joseph Crehan , Mickey Daniels , Eva Dennison , Rev. Neal Dodd , Oliver Eckhardt , Billy Engle , Bess Flowers , Blanche Frederici , Kit Guard , Sherry Hall , J. Frank Holliday , Harry Holman , Arthur Hoyt , Eddie Kane , Milt Kibbee , Claire McDowell , Hal Price , Tom Ricketts , Matty Roubert , Harry Todd , Maidel Turner , Henry Wadsworth , Charles C. Wilson , Frank Yaconelli , George Breakston , Fred Walton , Bert Starkey , Edmund Burns , Earl Pingree , Dave Wengren , Ky Robinson , Ethel Sykes

Frank Capra's seminal screwball comedy, which won all five major Academy Awards for 1934, is still as breezy and beguiling today. Claudette Colbert plays Ellie Andrews, a spoiled heiress who has marri... read more read more...ed fortune-hunting aviator King Westley (Jameson Thomas), despite her father (Walter Connolly)'s objections. To keep Ellie from marrying this lothario, her father has been holding her prisoner aboard his yacht. But Ellie bolts from the yacht, swims ashore in her clothes, and eventually slips onto a Greyhound bus bound for New York. Aboard the bus is newspaper reporter Peter Warne (Clark Gable), who has recently been fired for drinking on the job. Peter gets the last seat on the bus -- but when he gets up to argue with the bus driver, Ellie takes his seat. Since it is the last seat on the bus, they have to share it. When Ellie has her purse stolen and she refuses to report it, Peter begins to suspect something. The next morning, they both miss the bus after a leisurely breakfast, and Peter reveals that he knows her identity. She makes a deal with him: if he helps her get to New York, he can write a scoop about her for his paper. Peter thinks she is a spoiled brat, however, and refuses a monetary bribe: "I'm not interested in your money or your problem. You, King Westley, your father -- you're all a lot of hooey to me!" But as they travel northward and engage in a series of misadventures, the gruff newspaperman and the spoiled rich girl, thrown together by circumstances, fall in love with each other. This movie set the pace for the "screwball" comedy, the witty and romantic clash of temperaments between a man and a woman mismatched in both personality and social position, a type of movie often associated with Katherine Hepburn in such classics as Bringing Up Baby (1938), The Philadelphia Story (1940), and, with Spencer Tracy, Adam's Rib (1949), Pat and Mike (1952), and Desk Set (1957), among others. The only other movies to win all five major Academy Awards (Best Picture, Actor, Actress, Director, and Screenplay) were One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and The Silence of the Lambs (1991). ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

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Unrated, 1 hr. 45 min.

Directed by: Frank Capra

Release Date: February 22, 1934

Keywords: little, old, road

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DVD Release Date: December 28, 1999

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Flixster Reviews (2,091)

  • hunterjt13
    June 11, 2013
    hunterjt13
    With the company of a charming newspaperman, a woman flees her father to marry a man whom her father disapproves of.
    I've finally found a Frank Capra film that I don't find so saccharine that I found myself rolling my eyes all the way up into my cranium. This is not to say that ... read morethis film has any great substance. It's a high-energy, madcap farce that has just enough pathos to keep it from becoming Bringing Up Baby and just enough fun to keep Capra from making great pronouncements of life and morality.
    I thought that the characters' changes, particularly on the father's part, were too convenient, and Peter's near-abuse of Ellie makes it odd that she would have any great affection for him.
    Overall, though the film often defies credulity, it is one of my favorite Capra films, and I'm glad that I can finally like one of his movies.
  • blacksheepboy
    November 8, 2012
    blacksheepboy
    This charming classic may be the very first screwball comedy in Cinema, a funny, amusing and optimistic film with a deliciously sharp dialogue and wonderful performances from both Gable and Colbert - who have a great onscreen chemistry together.
  • fb1463751009
    September 24, 2012
    fb1463751009
    A classic movie that's the trumpet that tore down the walls of Jericho for me. "It Happened One Night" has it all: genuine tension, laughs, and character development to make even the most critical movie critic giggle with glee. Pure movie-making magic here. With a very slim narra... read moretive but extremely potent character development, "It Happened One Night" is a film that immerses audiences deeply into the relationships. You know that same formula every romantic film runs through? "It Happened One Night" is the definitive film that started it all, and it did so in spectacular fashion.
  • UniversalDreamer
    December 1, 2011
    UniversalDreamer
    "I wouldn't be caught dead with you!" I think, is the opening gambit that's the essential bedrock of all rom-coms (and then watching both parties swallow those fervent words-from-the-heart) and this, perhaps the first rom-com, does not disappoint. Throw in a little class strugg... read morele ... and bystanders who want love to happen as much as we ... and you've got movie history, movie magic.
  • fb1664868775
    November 13, 2011
    fb1664868775
    It Happened One Night is the original romantic comedy, and still the best (and the funniest).
  • cosmo313
    July 22, 2011
    cosmo313
    This film was the first to win the Big Five (picture, actor, actress, director, screenplay) at the Oscars. It's also often lauded as one of the sminal screwball comedies of the 30s.

    While I did enjoy this film, I found it to be merely really good instead of outstanding. Maybe t... read morehe material just didn't seem all that fresh and exciting to me. It is pretty funny and ridiculously charming though. The story concerns a spoiled newly married runaway heiress who meets up with an unemployed newsman and, wouldn't you know it, while traveling together, they fall in love.

    That's a rather cheeky synopsis, and there is a bit more to it than that, but essentially, that's the story. It's all done quite well though, and some of the bits (especially the hitchhiking scene) are priceless. The performances are good, and it is Frank Capra, so expect it to be full of charm and heart.

    Give this one a look. It's an old fashioned comedy, but there's nothing wrong with that. In fact, watching it in an era of over-the-top gross-out and shock comedies makes for a really nice refreshing treat.
  • jamers2011
    December 7, 2010
    jamers2011
    A classic film! So glad I finally had the opportunity to watch this film. It represents a turning point in Hollywood. This is the first true romcom. Claudette Colbert is fantastic here! I love the motel scene, hilarious!
  • ajv2688
    September 12, 2010
    ajv2688
    The first comedy to win an Oscar! If that's not a good enough reason to see this movie, remember that Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert are in the movie too, and they're so great together in this movie. This movie is really fun and entertaining.
  • FrizzDrop
    August 2, 2010
    FrizzDrop
    The first movie to take home the Oscar blockbuster, it's a beautiful film above love, pride, and the dephs to which we have to go for that one person.
  • DrZeek
    June 3, 2010
    DrZeek
    Peter Warne: A simple story about simple people.

    Often credited as the first romantic screwball comedy, this is a great film that easily holds up to today. The lead performances are wonderful due to how charmingly smug Gable is and the banter between him and Colbert; the story i... read mores simple but it delivers; and its a very funny movie.

    Classic comedy premise: A rebellious socialite, Ellie Andrews played by Claudette Colbert, marries King Wesley but her wealthy father has it annulled. Tired of her father's control, Ellie runs away by diving off the family yacht in Miami and heading for New York. On the bus she meets street-smart reporter Peter Warne, played by Clark Gable. They end up traveling together as Peter hopes to get a great story, and Ellie needs his worldly help. Nearing New York, with their many adventures coming to an end, they find that they are reluctantly in love and afraid to admit it to each other.

    Peter Warne: I never did like the idea of sitting on newspapers. I did it once, and all the headlines came off on my white pants. On the level! It actually happened. Nobody bought a paper that day. They just followed me around over town and read the news on the seat of my pants.

    This movie is just damn entertaining. Nearly everything comes together perfectly. The chemistry is just right, complete with strong, witty dialogue, a fun pace, keeping the film moving from place to place as our heroes trek up to New York, and a solid amount of humor and fun throughout the whole film.

    Certainly a strong classic that should be watched by anyone who is a fan of comedies or rom coms and is able to resist the urge of the most of the lame mainstream rom coms coming out today.

    Ellie Andrews: Your ego is absolutely colossal.
    Peter Warne: Yeah, yeah, not bad, how's yours?

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Critic Reviews

February 4, 2009
TIME Magazine

Instead of attempting a journalistic study of bus-travel, regularly punctuated by comic touches, Director Frank Capra and Robert Riskin who adapted Samuel Hopkins Adams' story, fused the two. Full Review

Variety Staff
February 19, 2008
Variety Staff, Variety

One of those stories that without a particularly strong plot manages to come through in a big way, due to the acting, dialog, situations and direction. Full Review

Dave Kehr
December 12, 2006
Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader

This is Capra at his best, very funny and very light, with a minimum of populist posturing. Full Review

Geoff Andrew
February 9, 2006
Geoff Andrew, Time Out

Capra's sense of humour is a little like that of Preston Sturges, though less caustic; and the film shows its stars at their best, Colbert as one of Hollywood's fresher comediennes, Gable as dumb-but-... Full Review

Mordaunt Hall
May 20, 2003
Mordaunt Hall, New York Times

It Happened One Night is a good piece of fiction, which, with all its feverish stunts, is blessed with bright dialogue and a good quota of relatively restrained scenes. Full Review

James Berardinelli
February 22, 1934
James Berardinelli, ReelViews

Its opposites-attract melding of screwball comedy and the road trip elements has become one of about a half-dozen standard love story formulas. Most years, there's at least one theatrical release that... Full Review

Eric Melin
February 12, 2013
Eric Melin, Lawrence.com

Gable and Colbert have charm to spare, and even though the tropes are well-worn and have been mishandled poorly by every by-the-book chick flick of the last 15 years, it still isn't enough to keep thi... Full Review

William Troy
January 15, 2013
William Troy, The Nation

Among the more gratifying phenomena of the current season has been the growing recognition of It Happened One Night, the Frank Capra production of last year, as one of the few potential classics of th... Full Review

Scott G. Mignola
January 2, 2011
Scott G. Mignola, Common Sense Media

Still one of the best screwball comedies. Full Review

Allan Hunter
November 1, 2010
Allan Hunter, Daily Express

A screwball comedy with charm and sass it established a template that countless films have followed down the decades. Full Review

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Facts

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    • Peter Warne: Oh, he flies through the air with the greatest of ease, the daring young man on the flying trapeze...
    • Ellie Andrews: We'll get on a merry-go-round and never get off. Promise me we'll never get off.
    • Peter Warne: I want to see what love looks like when it's triumphant. I haven't had a good laugh in a week.
    • Peter Warne: Why didn't you take off all your clothes? You could have stopped forty cars.
    • Ellie Andrews: Well, I proved once and for all that the limb is mightier than the thumb.
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It Happened One Night Trivia

  • Which director was at the helm of the following films: Arsenic and Old Lace; It's a Wonderful Life; Mr. Smith Goes to Washington; and It Happened One Night?  Answer »
  • Clark gable won an Oscar for his role in It Happened One Night?  Answer »
  • Name the movie where a runaway heiress and an old weary ex-reporter is in a dispute over the last seat in the bus.  Answer »
  • Who played Claudette Colberts love interest in the 1934 release of "It Happened One Night"?   Answer »
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