A Nonet of Arthur’s Best Movies

Actress Jean Arthur, who died Wednesday at 90, made more than 70 films in a career stretching from the silents to the early 1950s, but only a dozen are available on home video.

Luckily, however, nine of these films, made mostly between the late ‘30s and early ‘40s, are among her best. Nearly all are for rent or for sale in the $10-$20 range.

The nine:

* “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town” (RCA/Columbia, 1936). In one of her finest comic performances, Arthur portrays a tough reporter trying to find out why a shy, naive millionaire (Gary Cooper) gives all his money away--and falls for him in the process. Excellent social comedy directed by Frank Capra.

* “History Is Made at Night” (Vestron, 1937). In this drama, Arthur plays a distraught wife, escaping a vicious husband, who romances a suave Parisian (Charles Boyer). A little hokey at times but this is arguably Arthur’s most convincing dramatic performance.

* “You Can’t Take It With you” (RCA/Columbia, 1938). This film version of the Moss Hart-George S. Kaufman screwball comedy is about a daffy New York family adjusting to the daughter’s snooty boyfriend. The first successful teaming of Arthur, James Stewart and director Frank Capra, but the real reason to see this one is the crackling Hart-Kaufman one-liners. One of the top comedies of the ‘30s, it won the best picture Oscar.

* “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” (RCA/Columbia, 1939). Arthur, Stewart and Capra, together again. Stewart plays the earnest Senator battling political corruption with the help of a hard-boiled secretary (Arthur). Many forget that what helped make this one of Stewart’s great performances is his sizzling chemistry with Arthur.

* “The Devil and Miss Jones” (Republic, 1941). The underrated comic gem of Arthur’s career. She makes the usually drab Robert Cummings, who plays her love interest, shine for a change. But the funniest lines go to Charles Coburn, portraying a millionaire who goes undercover as an employee in his department store to solve labor problems.

* “The Talk of the Town” (RCA/Columbia, 1942). Literate, provocative comedy featuring Arthur as a landlady caught in a triangle with a stern law professor (Ronald Coleman) and a fugitive radical (Cary Grant).

* “A Lady Takes a Chance” (VidAmerica, 1943). In this romantic comedy, Arthur plays a city slicker who travels West and falls for a rodeo champ (John Wayne). Not one of her best-known movies but worth a look because the chemistry between the stars pushes Wayne to possibly the best comic performance of his career.

* “The More the Merrier” (RCA/Columbia, 1943). One of the great unsung comedies of the ‘40s and a film-buff favorite, it’s centered around the housing shortage in Washington during World War II, with an unlikely threesome (Arthur, Joel McCrea and Charles Coburn) forced to share an apartment. Arthur prods stodgy McCrea into a marvelous performance. Coburn won a best supporting actor Oscar.

* “Shane” (Paramount, 1953). The males--Alan Ladd, Van Helfin, Brandon de Wilde and Jack Palance--are memorable in this must-see classic about a gunfighter (Ladd) helping homesteaders fight wicked cattlemen. However, as a pioneer woman, Arthur, in her last film, never seems at home on the range.

The other three on home video:

* “Danger Lights” (Video Yesteryear, 1930). Arthur plays a vixen who dumps a kindly, workaholic beau for a dashing young engineer. Early talkie of interest only to the heartiest Arthur fans.

* “The Plainsman” (MCA/Universal, 1937). Cowboys and Indians on a lavish scale, directed by Cecil B. DeMille. The biggest calamity is Arthur as Calamity Jane, looking very out of place in this Western centered around Jane’s romance with Wild Bill Hickock (Gary Cooper). Mainly of interest if you care about big-budget Westerns of the ‘30s.

* “Only Angels Have Wings” (RCA/Columbia, 1939). Cary Grant co-stars with Arthur, who plays a tough showgirl, in this romantic adventure from director Howard Hawks about macho mail pilots flying in South America. It’s a fun action film but Arthur’s role isn’t that strong or well-written.