Kathleen Howard reprises her role from It's a Gift as WC Fields' shrewish wife, but the great comic star has a more loving daughter (Mary Brian) this time around to sweeten the dish. It's a Gift was hilarious, but awfully cold. Again there is a collection of sketches built around a loose narrative. Ambrose Wolfinger just wants to go to the wrestling...
The best episode is the opener when Fields is forced down into the cellar by his wife to confront two burglars who are getting mellowly drunk on Wolfinger's applejack. Fields, the intruders and a cop end up harmonising sentimental Irish ballads together. For all of them, this is brief moment of respite seized from the hell of domesticity.
It's such a funny film because Fields' comic persona is so identifiable. His suffering is revealed so pitifully, with a sudden nervous reflex or a mumbled aside. He has grown to accept his malign fate. There's nothing he can do about it.
Fields is always doing what he is asked, however absurd. Then is admonished when the outcome proves to be unsatisfactory. He acts without complaint or hope, and then gets nailed for it. And who doesn't know how that feels?! This is my pick as his best film.