I'm not sure why this film doesn't work. It has everything I love about screwball comedies in it, and the wonderful Joel McCrea is gorgeous.
Where does it go wrong? I'm not quite as knocked out by Preston Sturges as the rest of the world because I think he's too prone to pointlessly noisy madcap chase scenes, and more often that not his endings suck a lot, but Preston Sturges' screwballs really work (apart from the chases and the endings) and this film doesn't. The difference, then, must be script. Sturges' scripts are superb, glittering things, that you just want to eat with a spoon, and Woman Chases Man is a fairly charming film with a lifeless script.
Where does it go wrong? I'm not quite as knocked out by Preston Sturges as the rest of the world because I think he's too prone to pointlessly noisy madcap chase scenes, and more often that not his endings suck a lot, but Preston Sturges' screwballs really work (apart from the chases and the endings) and this film doesn't. The difference, then, must be script. Sturges' scripts are superb, glittering things, that you just want to eat with a spoon, and Woman Chases Man is a fairly charming film with a lifeless script.