Imagine getting hit on the head so hard that, when you wake up, you have lost nine years and you think you are another person. That is essentially the premise of I Love You Again (1940), though the title gives none of this away. All the same, this is what happens early on to Lawrence “Larry” Wilson (William Powell), who is smacked on the head by a boat oar in 1940 and comes to thinking it is 1931 and he is George Carey. God allows us to get into all kinds of interesting situations, and He has already provided us with every tool we need to deal with any of them, including amnesia mixed with grandiose delusions. The way Larry handles this situation, at least initially, is not what one would call Christian, but it also affords him the opportunity to do better. It makes for a satisfying conclusion that is a hallmark of Powell’s films when he teamed with Myrna Loy.

That opportunity to eventually say I Love You Again begins aboard a cruise ship, where Larry tries to rescue the drunken “Doc” Ryan (Frank McHugh) after he falls overboard, only to be struck on the head by an oar during the rescue. When Larry awakens, he insists that his name is George Carey and that the year is 1931, his last memory being a blow to the head received while working as a confidence man. Doc, who happens to be a con man himself, quickly realizes that George apparently spent the intervening nine years suffering from amnesia and living as the respectable Lawrence Wilson. The discovery that Larry has $147,000 in one bank account gives George a powerful incentive to continue impersonating the man he unknowingly became, with Doc posing as his physician. The plan immediately becomes more complicated when the ship docks and George meets Katherine “Kay” Wilson (Myrna Loy), the wife he does not remember having. Kay is preparing to divorce Larry because life with the miserly, humorless civic leader has become intolerably dull, and she is now engaged to Herbert (Donald Douglas). George, who finds his supposed wife considerably more interesting than Larry apparently did, is intrigued by both the marriage and the prospect of getting his hands on Larry’s money. He soon learns, however, that much of the impressive bank balance belongs to charitable organizations for which Larry serves as treasurer, making simply emptying the accounts a poor option even by George’s standards, not to mention Catholic ones. Instead, he and Doc decide to take advantage of Larry’s impeccable reputation to swindle some of Habersville’s wealthier citizens. George summons his former partner Duke Sheldon (Edmund Lowe), who prepares an oil scam by planting petroleum on a piece of otherwise worthless land owned by Larry. In the meantime, George settles into the life he cannot remember, discovering that Larry is a teetotaler, a penny-pincher, a leader of assorted civic causes, and generally the sort of man who has managed to become respected by practically everyone except his own wife. Kay is bewildered when her husband suddenly drinks, spends money freely, flirts with her, buys her gifts, and behaves as though marriage might actually be enjoyable. George asks her to postpone the divorce for six weeks, ostensibly to protect Larry’s reputation while he completes his scheme, but his interest in the delay becomes increasingly personal. Even Herbert has difficulty coping with the transformed husband, while George begins enjoying the domestic life he initially regarded only as another opportunity for profit. The oil swindle advances when George discovers that Larry leads a troop of Junior Rangers. Since several of the boys are sons of prosperous local businessmen, he takes the troop on an outing near the planted oil, where young Leonard Harkspur Jr. (Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer) and the others make the conveniently profitable discovery. Word reaches their fathers, who approach George with an offer to buy the land without admitting why they want it. Duke then appears as part of the con and drives up the price by pretending to have his own interest in the property. The scheme seems poised to make George a great deal of money, but by then he has acquired something he values more. Kay admits that the man who returned from the cruise is the sort of husband she had wanted Larry to be all along, breaks with Herbert, and tells George that she loves him. George realizes that he loves her as well and decides to abandon the swindle, telling Doc that he would rather remain in Habersville, live honestly, and stay married to Kay. He even offers Doc legitimate work, suggesting that nine years as Larry may have left more of a mark on George than he would care to admit. Duke is considerably less enthusiastic about this sudden moral reformation and threatens to expose George unless the scheme proceeds. Kay, meanwhile, overhears enough of a telephone conversation between Doc and Duke to discover the truth about her husband’s amnesia and criminal past. George confronts Duke and tries to end the con, but their disagreement turns into a fight, and Duke knocks him unconscious. When George awakens, he appears to have reverted to Larry, once again behaving like the painfully proper man Kay had intended to divorce. Duke departs, believing another blow to the head has undone the first, while Kay is devastated at apparently losing the man with whom she has fallen in love. Reasoning that another blow might restore George, she picks up a vase and prepares to solve the problem rather directly. Before she can test this unusual medical theory, “Larry” gives himself away by making the same lovesick dove call George had used while courting her. He has only been pretending to have lost his memory again in order to escape Duke and the swindle. Kay joyfully embraces him, leaving George with the respectable life he once intended to rob and the wife he has managed, quite literally, to fall in love with again.

As you can see, the movie is quite literally an opportunity to say I Love You Again. It is not how Larry approached it, though, when he first awakened and thought it was 1931. Granted, he did not know he had a wife initially until the ship docked. Instead, he basically planned to rob himself. Then, when he found out that he would have to swindle a charity, he came up with the real estate scheme. None of these are activities God would look upon favorably when He judges Larry’s soul, unless he is Catholic and genuinely repented of his sins. While he does not seek redress with the Almighty, he certainly does so with Kay. When it comes to our lives and the direction in which God wants us to take them, He provides sometimes subtle, sometimes not-so-subtle hints as to what He wants us to do. It takes patient and quiet discernment to recognize these promptings. Unfortunately, that is not what you get with Larry. This is partially due to the fact that it is a wacky romantic comedy with an absurd premise. It would be strange for him to suddenly turn philosophical about the circumstances of his life or pray. Nonetheless, there are some lessons that we can take from his behavior vis-à-vis his relationship with Kay. Larry may not be listening to God, but he listens to his wife, and that is an important component of a Christian marriage. St. Paul does say, “Wives should be subordinate to their husbands as to the Lord,” in Ephesians 5:22, but that was never intended as a power dynamic, with men dominating their spouses. Instead, a few verses later, it restores the equality of the situation by talking about how much men are asked to serve their wives, treating them with the kind of love Jesus has for the Church. This is a roundabout way of explaining that a married couple should cherish one another, and Kay and Larry have to learn to do so.

It is easy to learn to love a movie like I Love You Again. As always, Loy and Powell are helpful. What is less so is the realization I had while watching this movie that someday my supply of their films will run out. When that happens, it will be an opportunity to find something hopefully as good.