A Yank at Oxford (1938)

User Rating:

6.6/10   

Director:

Jack Conway

Writers:

John Monk Saunders (idea)
Leon Gordon (story) ...

Release Date:

18 February 1938 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Romance | Sport

Tagline:

Here's The Yankee Clipper Himself ! A two-fisted terror from the States . . . who landed in England with a chip on his shoulder . . . but let a blue-eyed beauty walk off with his heart ! Bob Taylor's Biggest Picture Hit !

Plot:

Lee Sheridan, a young American comes to study at Oxford University, but is instantly disliked by the other students...

Plot Keywords:

College | Book Seller | Oxford | Rowing | Unsportsmanlike Behavior

Cast

Robert Taylor	...	Lee Sheridan
Lionel Barrymore	...	Dan Sheridan
Maureen O'Sullivan	...	Molly Beaumont
Vivien Leigh	...	Elsa Craddock
Edmund Gwenn	...	Dean of Cardinal
Griffith Jones	...	Paul Beaumont
C.V. France	...	Dean Snodgrass
Edward Rigby	...	Scatters
Morton Selten	...	Cecil Davidson, Esq.
Claude Gillingwater	...	Ben Dalton
Tully Marshall	...	Cephas
Walter Kingsford	...	Dean Williams
Robert Coote	...	Wavertree
Peter Croft	...	Ramsey
Noel Howlett	...	Tom Craddock

Runtime:

USA:102 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Certification:

Finland:K-16 | USA:Approved (PCA #4009)

Filming Locations:

Denham Studios, Denham, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer British Studios

Trivia:

In a scene shortly after arriving at Oxford, Sheridan meets with his assigned tutor, who asks him, "What are you reading?" by which he means what is your field of study. Sheridan, confused, replies, "Well, I am reading 'Gone With The Wind', but I am only halfway through it." Vivien Leigh, also in this movie, would of course portray Scarlett in Gone with the Wind (1939) which was released the year after this movie. Reportedly, it was known as early as 1937 from a Selznick memo that Leigh had secured the role.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Vivien Leigh: Scarlett & Beyond (1990) (TV)

Soundtrack:

Academic Festival Overture in C, Opus 80

Pleasing entertainment

A YANK AT OXFORD offers a quaint version of Oxford academia in which days are spent boating on the river or running on the track rather than sitting in a stuffy classroom with a textbook the size of a housebrick; a world in which students wear suits and smoke pipes, and flee for the back door of the pub whenever a professor is seen.

Robert Taylor plays the conceited but likeable 'Yank' of the title in this typical 'fish out of water' movie that starts strongly before rambling a little as it concentrates on the animosity he encounters from another student (Griffith Jones, giving a solid performance). Taylor's a little too old for the part, but still has the boyish good-looks that faded so badly in the Forties. A flighty Vivien Leigh and a pretty Maureen O'Sullivan both look young and fresh, and add a little brightness to the fusty old halls of academia.

The movie offers a picture of a pre-World War II world that perhaps never existed, although it would be nice to believe that it did. Either way, it's a pleasant way to lose yourself from the modern world for 90 minutes.