“I’ve never met a woman before who could make speeches, call strikes, serve pancakes, and look beautiful all at the same time,” pianist Philip tells waitress Helen. But such unexpected conjunctions are all in a day’s work for this film that manages to combine Depression-era labor struggles with dreamlike romance. Helen and Philip (Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer, renewing a pairing from 1939’s Love Affair) take shelter for a night from a stormy world, but reality intrudes in the morning, in the form of Philip’s wife. Based on a James M. Cain story, When Tomorrow Comes was remade by Douglas Sirk as Interlude.

—Juliet Clark