Mae West plays a top movie star and self-centered seductress in Go West, Young Man, an adaptation of a play called Personal Appearance, written by Lawrence Riley (West wrote the screenplay herself). West’s restless character, Mavis Arden, has an unusual clause in her studio contract: she is not allowed to marry anyone for five years. Enforcing this rule is her long-suffering press agent, Morgan (Warren William), who goes to great and creative lengths to sabotage any romantic interludes Mavis has arranged with potential lovers.
Despite that, Morgan agrees to escort Mavis to a secret meeting with a politician who has wooed her but can’t afford politically to be seen with her. But on the long drive to the assignation, the limousine carrying Mavis and Morgan breaks down in a small, rustic farm town. The car repair will take a full day, meaning Mavis’ presence will likely kick up a storm of fan excitement, which is precisely what happens. Mavis retreats to her room in a boarding house, but when she spots the strapping mechanic, Bud (Randolph Scott0, fixing her car, she turns on all her slinky, predatory moves in an effort to seduce him.
Go West, Young Man came relatively late during the peak of West’s popularity and proved to be both an unusual and somewhat awkward vehicle for her. Her trademark schtick with wiggles and rolling hips is a little out of place in the bucolic setting, where plenty of charming, funny, supporting characters are much more fun to watch. The good news is that director Henry Hathaway (the original True Grit) brings buoyancy to the film that is infectious, from a swooping shot of a theater crowd in the film’s opening moments to the crispness of the cast’s near-screwball comedy performance. Randolph Scott, a star in his own right, is a lot of fun in the traditional comedy role of an idiosyncratic male who becomes the target of a designing woman. Lightly recommended.