One Way Passage

1932

Comedy / Drama / Music / Romance

7
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Certified Fresh 100% · 6 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Upright 80% · 250 ratings
IMDb Rating 7.5/10 10 4713 4.7K

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Plot summary

A terminally ill woman and a debonair murderer facing execution meet and fall in love on a trans-Pacific crossing, each without knowing the other's secret.

Director

Top cast

William Powell as Dan Hardesty
Kay Francis as Joan Ames
Allan Lane as Friend of Joan's
Aline MacMahon as Barrel House Betty
720p.BLU 1080p.BLU
623.08 MB
1280*934
English 2.0
NR
23.976 fps
1 hr 7 min
Seeds ...
1.13 GB
1480*1080
English 2.0
NR
23.976 fps
1 hr 7 min
Seeds 2

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by blanche-2 8 / 10

Two doomed people fall in love

Kay Francis and William Powell are doomed lovers in "One Way Passage," a 1932 film also starring Frank McHugh, Aline McMahan and Warren Hymer.Right after meeting the lovely Joan Ames in a bar, escaped murderer Dan Hardesty is caught by Sgt. Steve Burke and brought back to San Francisco via ship to be hanged. Ames is also on board ship; she's dying of an incurable illness (probably some form of heart disease they couldn't do anything about in 1932).Knowing the sergeant can't swim, Hardesty, handcuffed to him, jumps overboard and, while trying to drown Burke, steals the handcuff key and frees himself. When Burke yells for help, it draws attention from passengers, and Hardesty has no choice but to save him.To thank him for saving his life, Burke lets Hardesty walk around the ship with no handcuffs. Thus, when he and Joan meet again, she has no idea he's headed for a death sentence, and he doesn't know about her.I saw Carol Burnett do a send-up of either this or the remake - just think if Burnett were on TV today, no one would have any idea what she was doing. How times have changed.This is a beautiful film with wonderful performances, not only from Powell and Francis, but from Frank McHugh, Aline McMahon, and Warren Hymer. McHugh is a petty crook who runs into McMahon, another crook who is posing as a countess. She catches the eye of Sgt. Burke. It's a great subplot with some fun moments.Powell is gallant, melancholy, and charming, and Francis is glamorous and lovely; both give very touching and sweet performances, each knowing he/she isn't going to live.Each time they drink together, they break their glasses and cross the stems, and this crossing is something the camera focuses on as they sit in a cove in Hawaii and toss away their cigarettes. The ending is one of the best ever and will make the viewer smile and cry at the same time.It's 1932, so some of the sound seems to have been done in an echo chamber, but that shouldn't bother anyone. "One Way Passage" is a treasure of a film.
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Reviewed by bkoganbing 8 / 10

A Doomed Romance

In between his time with Paramount and MGM, William Powell did a two year stint at Warner Brothers where I don't think Jack and his brothers ever quite knew what to do with him. His films there, vary in quality, but the best of them is this doomed romance with Kay Francis, One Way Passage. The title itself tells how poignant this film will be.

Powell is a fugitive who is tracked down and brought aboard ship in handcuffs by San Francisco Detective Warren Hymer. Powell escaped while being transported to San Quentin to be hung for murder. At the same time good time party girl Kay Francis is traveling home essentially to die. Unsaid at the time because the audience knew what the effects of bootleg liquor were on some people from the Roaring Twenties. Her organs are generally failing and she's coming home to die.

These two people are as poignant a pair of lovers as has ever been brought to the screen. Neither knows about the other and the aura of heartbreak just permeates One Way Passage. It's a cosmic joke played on them, both finding in each other a reason to live and both knowing it can't be.

Warren Hymer plays it a great deal straighter than he normally does. He's not the brightest cop in the world, but he's a far from the dim witted hooligans he usually is cast. Aline McMahon and Frank McHugh are a pair of confidence workers who both team up to help the doomed Powell and Francis. McHugh repeated his own role in the remake of One Way Passage from 1940, Till We Meet Again.

The most cynical heart will melt in seeing One Way Passage.

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