Ayres is a degenerate gambler (who cleans up nice) and Rogers is the girl who loves him, despite herself, of course, in this breezy melodrama. In terms of particulars, it has almost nothing to recommend it. Ayres is a little bit too believable as the callous lead, who purposely eschews all advice as he lucks into horse win after horse win (at least if he’d had a system, it might seem purposeful, but apparently, he just guesses well). It makes for problems with making him sympathetic. He doesn’t deserve a happy ending, much less one where Rogers saves him from homelessness.

As for Rogers, she’s a little bit better than Ayres, but she’s uneven in this regular girl role. It’s unbelievable she’d wait ten minutes for Ayres, much less two or three years.

The best acting is from Charley Grapewin as Ayres’s father and Tom Dugan as his sidekick. Grapewin masterfully combines the knowing elder with the concerned parent, with a dash of the disapproving parent thrown in. His performance might be the film’s showiest in some ways, but it’s also the truest. Dugan’s just the faithful sidekick, who only has to be sturdy when Ayres’s acting like a gambling addict moron, which comes up a lot in the second half. And Dugan does have the film’s only funny sequence.

Roth’s direction isn’t flashy–he does move the camera for dramatic effect quite a bit, sometimes to good effect–but it’s solid.

Don’t Bet on Love‘s almost a decent hour.

★

CREDITS

Directed by Murray Roth; written by Howard Emmett Rogers, Roth and Ben Ryan; director of photography, Jackson Rose; edited by Robert Carlisle; music by David Klatzkin; produced by Carl Laemmle Jr.; released by Universal Pictures.

Starring Lew Ayres (Bill McCaffery), Ginger Rogers (Molly Gilbert), Charley Grapewin (Pop McCaffery), Shirley Grey (Goldie Williams), Tom Dugan (Scotty), Merna Kennedy (Ruby ‘Babe’ Norton), Lucile Gleason (Mrs. Gilbert) and Robert Emmett O’Connor (Edward Shelton).