Seeing The Love Trap and Be Yourself close together is instructional in seeing two films made during the transitional period from silent films to talkies. In terms of narratives, if the cliches didn't start with these films, they weren't too old either. The Love Trap is about the chorus girl in love with the boy from the wealthy society family. Be Yourself is about a champion boxer and the manager-girlfriend who loves him. Anyone who’s seen more than three films from the early Thirties can pretty much guess the story arc. What may be of more interest than either narrative is seeing, and hearing, how two filmmakers take on the challenge of sound.

The Love Trap would seem the more awkward, starting out as a silent film with titles and a synchonized music score, more than halfway shifting to spoken dialogue. Wyler appears to have instinctively understood how to film people speaking without it looking stagey, cutting from full to medium shot. Even if there is less camera movement, the use of editing allows The Love Trap to flow rather than falter.

The Love Trap features Laura La Plante as an early version of that filmic archtype, the ditsy blonde. Thrown out from the chorus because she can't dance, La Plante temporarily plays party girl for the night before deciding she has her scruples, no matter that the rent is due. Escaping wearing a robe from what appears to be a compromising position, she finds her belongings out in the street. As if that's not enough, it rains that night. La Plante is rescued by wealthy young man Neil Hamilton. While happily married, La Plante's past comes to haunt her.

Even though the dialogue is spoken in a style more suitable for stage than screen, Wyler uses that as way way of underscoring the silliness of the story. La Plante, who I have never seen before, is fun to watch because of her ability to make a fool of herself, whether stumbling drunk or literally getting mud in her eye. It may also be that Wyler, who has had a reputation for being involved with some of his leading ladies, found The Love Trap a great excuse for filming Laura La Plante frequently in her lingerie. The Love Trap is everything that Ben-Hur is not - short, sexy and funny.

Be Yourself is primarily of interest for those who might want to have a glimpse of the real Fanny Brice. While her singing voice is closer to that of Ethel Merman, Brice is not the mugging, annoying screen presence that is Barbra Streisand. While the film starts of nicely with a dolly shot of the audience at a boxing match that moves into the ring with the two boxers, too often the film is static. Director Thornton Freeland is remembered, if at all, for Flying Down to Rio. Be Yourself looks like the work of people who were intimidated by the new technology. Many of the scenes are shot as full shots, with characters entering and exiting through doors. Robert Armstrong, as the dumb lug of a boxer who wins Brice's heart is especially awkward. Better is seeing Brice sing two very different versions of the same song, once upbeat and again as a tearjerker. It is quite possible that this film played a part in the title of the musical version of the life of Fanny Brice. Twice, her character is refered to as a "funny girl".