The Secret Bride

Barbara Stanwyck was the TCM Star of the month back in early 2025, and surprisingly there were some of her films that I hadn't seen before. So I recorded a couple, and I think I'm getting to the last of the films from the tribute that I recorded. The movie in question is The Secret Bride.

Now, the marriage isn't a secret to the viewer, as it happens right at the beginning of the movie. Robert Sheldon (Warren William) is the Attorney General of an unnamed state, and he's run off to get eloped to Ruth Vincent (Barbara Stanwyck) right at the beginning of the movie. Part of the reason for the elopement is that Ruth is the adult daughter of the governor. After the wedding in front of a justice of the peace, Robert calls his office to tell them he'll be back soon. Picking up the phone is Robert's secretary/assistant Hazel Normandie (Glenda Farrell). She hands the phone to Dave Breeden (Douglass Dumbrille), who is Robert's chief investigator as well as Hazel's boyfriend. Dave tells Robert he's going to pick up somebody on a tip, but can't go into details over the phone.

Cut to a bank just as it's opening up. Being let in by the security guard is Willis Martin (Grant Mitchell). Willis is making a deposit of $10,000 in cash, but it's to the personal account that's not his, as we soon learn because he's picked up by the authorities -- that tip Dave mentioned obviously is about this deposit and both who it's from, and whose account is getting it. Willis is the executive assistant to one J.F. Holdstock, a businessman who was sent to prison on fiancial fraud crimes but was pardoned by the current governor. The clear implication is that the deposit will be seen as Holdstock having bribed the governor for the pardon. Worse is that not long after this, Holdstock is found dead of a suicide, which is an implicit admission of guilt.

Now, Sheldon is loyal to the governor, and knows that the governor didn't really engage in any wrongdoing. But there's a problem, which is that marriage to the governor's daughter. If that comes out, then nobody will believe the Attorney General is acting independently. Nowadays, a special prosecutor would be appointed and people would act like the special prosecutor is independent and unbiased. But they didn't have things like that back in the day.

It gets worse when Breeden comes to see Sheldon that evening. Sheldon has brought Ruth back to his place, and Hazel is working there as well. So when Breeden comes, Hazel goes out to the courtyard to meet him. In the courtyard, Breeden gets shot and killed! Now, we know that the angle he was shot from should exonerate Hazel, never mind the fact that we've seen it. I'd have thought that Breeden was shot from far enough away that Hazel wouldn't have had time to get into the position from which the shooter took the shot. But a small handgun that Hazel had purchased is found at the scene and is determined to be the murder weapon. So for these obvious reasons she's put on trial. Ruth saw what happened, too. But, if she were to testify, it would reveal that she's married to Robert, which would likely end his and the governor's careers because of that controversy over the apparent cash-for-pardon scheme.

The Secret Bride was released in December 1934, a few months after the Production Code really took effect, so you can guess that the good guys are going to win in the end. And the Ruth Vincent and Robert Sheldon characters are never portrayed as anything less than good. Maybe they're a bit naïve in the way they're acting, but they're clearly not on the take. So that's part of the flaw that The Secret Bride has. The movie has to get to a certain end, and the way it gets there and resolves all the plot issues is a bit too convoluted for its own good.

However, if you don't pay too close attention to the plot, you'll find that The Secret Bride is a fine example of the Warner Bros. programmer as it was in the mid-1930s. It's a brisk 64 minutes, and never stops moving -- and frankly never stops being entertaining either. It moves so fast that I can easily see audiences of the day not particularly caring about the plot holes, and remains worth a watch 90 years on.