Life Begins for Andy Hardy

Andy Hardy has just graduated high school, and so he ponders what comes next. His father has dreams of him attending his own alma mater, Wainwright college, and going into law. Looking at the long journey that would be - seven years of college - he decides to break out on his own and see what life on his own would be like. So he drives to New York City in search of a job.

He gets a room in a kind of high-rise boarding house for guys, back when women were not allowed past the front desk. His search for a job, though, is arduous until he finally lands one as an office boy at a stock brokerage concern.

Before he gets the job though, he runs out of money, can't get his car out of hock in storage, and goes hungry for a few days. At one point, his roommate, unable to get a job in what he wants to do, even kills himself in the bathroom, with Andy discovering the body! So this is not your average Andy Hardy film.

There is one really odd scene between Andy and his father, the judge. Usually I can easily see the rather timeless lessons the judge is trying to teach, but this one seems mid Victorian. The judge has noticed the flirting going on between Andy and the woman a few years older - she's probably 25 or so - who also works at the brokerage. The judge says that people should be faithful to their spouses before they even meet them, because lots of casual "dating" - to be euphemistic about it - makes it hard to be faithful to a spouse once you have one. So much for sowing one's wild oats!