Although Tay Garnett's best single film was certainly the tragic romance One Way Passage, he was best known as a director in the Raoul Walsh category, his real forte being rough melodrama, often maritime, with a strong leavening of sex and hard-boiled sentiment: Slave Ship, China Seas, The Postman Always Rings Twice. His early Pathé and RKO period is especially interesting, since, at a time when films were talkative and static, his films really moved and had a strong visual sense. Although Her Man is a loose reworking of the Frankie and Johnnie theme, it is very much Garnett's own: he co-wrote the story, and his later (1940) Seven Sinners with Dietrich and Wayne is a much-laundered by the Production Code but still gutsy remake, with many characters and individual incidents common to both. This includes the outsize climactic and stuntmen-filled saloon brawl-better and more elaborately choreographed in the remake, but done here with amazing gusto for a 1930 movie. A bit old fashioned, Helen Twelvetrees is an acquired taste, but she suffered even more nobly than Sylvia Sidney and here she has a veritable field-day. All in all, Her Man holds up well as rowdy, exciting and sometimes quite moving melodramatic entertainment. --WKE The Story: In this film, Frankie (Helen Twelvetrees), a pickpocket, works the crowd at a sleazy bar while Johnnie (Ricardo Cortez) backs her up with a liberally applied stiletto. Of course, Frankie meets a young American sailor (Phillips Holmes) who wants to take her away from all of this. The rest is history, punctuated by some large-scale fisticuffs.