Hard to Get (1938 film)
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Ray Enright |
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| Music by | Heinz Eric Roemheld |
| Cinematography | Charles Rosher |
| Edited by | Thomas Richards |
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| Distributed by | Warner Bros. Pictures |
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Running time
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82 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Hard to Get is a 1938 American romantic comedy film directed by Ray Enright and starring Dick Powell and Olivia de Havilland. Written by Jerry Wald, Maurice Leo, and Richard Macaulay, the film is about a spoiled young heiress who tries to charge some gasoline at an auto court and is forced by the attendant to work out her bill by making beds and cleaning rooms. Resolving to get even, she pretends to have forgiven him, and then sends him to her father to get financing for his plan to develop a string of auto courts across the country, knowing he will only be wasting his time. Hard to Get was released by Warner Bros. Pictures in the United States on November 5, 1938.
New York oil magnate Ben Richards (Charles Winninger) and his family are preparing to leave for Newport for their summer vacation. His spoiled willful daughter Margaret (Olivia de Havilland) refuses to go and storms out of the house, borrowing a car belonging to her father's valet. On the road she notices the car is low on gas and stops at an auto court gas station. The attendant, Bill Davis (Dick Powell), fills up the tank and requests the $3.50 payment. With no money on her, Margaret tries to charge the amount to her father's account, but Bill refuses, not knowing who she is. Instead, he offers to let her work off her debt by making the beds and cleaning the rooms at the auto court motel. Outraged by this suggestion, Margaret attempts to drive off, but backs into a truck preventing her from leaving. When a police officer arrives, Margaret is forced to comply with Bill's offer, and she spends the next few hours making beds and cleaning rooms.
Margaret returns home vowing revenge on Bill for his treatment of her. At first she asks her father—who is on the board of the oil company that owns the station—to have Bill fired. After listening to her story, however, her father agrees with the way Bill handled the issue and tells her she'll have to find her own way of getting her revenge. The next day, Margaret returns to the auto court gas station and apologizes to Bill, pretending to have forgiven him. Attracted to the beautiful heiress, who now pretends to be her family's maid "Maggie", Bill asks her on a date and she accepts.
That night, Bill sneaks them into a banquet for a free dinner, then takes her up to the Empire State Building, where he tells her about his dream of building a string of auto courts across the country. Margaret tells him she thinks it's a great idea and sends him to her father to get financing for his plan—even providing him her father's old nickname "Spouter" so the secretaries will think he is one of Ben's old friends. Margaret knows that when her father sees that Bill used the nickname to pretend he was an old friend, he will make his life miserable.
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