best movie i've ever seen.

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

Liberal drug use, infidelity out in the open, and the life of a career jewel robber romanticized and celebrated: yes, we're firmly in pre-code territory here folks. The film is frank, sophisticated and deliciously amoral. Suave William Powell and chic-but-naughty Kay Francis are perfectly cast (in one of their many screen pairings). My favorite line: "Tonight is not the night to give you a name, but to forget mine". *** out of 4.

Kay Francis was never, in my possibly limited experience, so light and charming, even though her character is stupid and immoral.Her speech defect, which I had never noticed before, was very apparent in this role, but seems to have just added another layer of charm.William Powell, as the thief who preferred to be called "robber," was his usual self, which is pretty good.But, all in all, this is a pretty bad movie.The last shot is a regrettable reminder we have been wasting our time on a movie, and the movie as a whole is, indeed, pretty much a waste of time.Stupid and immoral people are too much in the news to be also a source of entertainment.Good directing and pretty good acting do not make up for the absence of any quality in the story.

This film has to be on the short list of films-that-epitomize-pre-code-Hollywood. Adultery, drugs, crime, flaunting of morals and convention, free-spirit thumbing their nose, all done with humour and glamour. One can understand why the church was upset! Problem was that there were many films that played on these themes so it must have seemed that Hollywood was really out to corrupt the world. This one has the full package but with a wink and smoothness that today's garbage film-makers would never have the patience to pull-off. Too bad the code swung the pendulum way too far in the other direction. A must-see for Francis and Powell fans.

William Powell is a smooth jewel thief who captivates Kay Francis in "Jewel Robbery," a 1932 film made before the dreaded code kicked in. Set in Vienna, Francis plays a baroness who, like her friends, has married a dull man for money and takes lovers. While her husband is buying her a 28-carat diamond and she's arguing with her boyfriend, William Powell and his team enter to rob the store. It's love at first sight.This is a slight but very amusing film, interesting for the racy story line, the outfits, and Kay Francis herself. A very unusual-looking woman, Francis' heyday was in the '30s, and everything about her screamed '30s, of course - her hair, her fashions, and the kind of films she made. She's somewhat frozen in time there. Powell is his usual dashing, delightful self, and the two work very well together. The scene at Powell's place is particularly interesting, as she demands not to be asked to do anything, but to be forced, at which point, he picks her up and throws her onto his huge bed. "But there are so many pleasant in between steps," she objects.A delightful movie, not terribly long, but fascinating given the era in film in which it was made.