Zeus

Father Takes A Walk (1935)

• Director
  • William Beaudine
• Writers
  • Mary Roberts Rinehart(by)
  • Brock Williams(screenplay)
• Stars
  • Paul Graetz
  • Violet Farebrother
  • Chili Bouchier

  This gentle ethnic drama from the UK concerns Jake Cohen, a wealthy, self-made Jewish entrepreneur who began his career as a humble peddler and, over the decades, turned his business into a massive, booming department store with thousands of workers. When his sons begin employing modern technologies and business methods in the store, they alienate their father, who pines for the old days and the old ways of doing things. Jake's youngest son takes off for America, and falls in love with Irish lass Sally O'Connor (Meriel Ferbes) on his way home. They become engaged, much to the consternation of Jake and his wife, who have long assumed that the boy would marry his Jewish childhood sweetheart. Then, suddenly, Jake's wife dies of a heart attack. Devastated by the loss, and increasingly irritated by his sons' modernization of the business, Jake dresses in peddler's clothes and heads west, to walk the fields of England. However, he soon reads in the newspaper that his 3,000 employees have staged a strike in protest of the sons' decision not to give them the perks that Jake conceded to, prior to the takeover. He hops a pig-filled truck back to London, where he wrests control of the business from his sons, resorts once again to his "old business methods," and - in the final scenes of the picture -- gives his youngest express permission to marry a Gentile. The film wraps with two weddings for the boy and Sally, one in a Jewish synagogue and one in a Catholic church.