Ringside Maisie (DVD)

Tough times for Maisie. In rapid order she's bounced from her taxi-dancer job, reduced to her last 60 cents by her landlady, given the heave-ho after sneaking aboard a train that would take her to a nightclub job in the Adirondacks and then, after getting to the gig by other means, is sacked because she won't be, uh, friendly with her lothario of a dance partner. Is Maisie (Ann Sothern) feeling low? "I could look a snake in the eye -- if I had a pair of stilts," she says. But the buoyant Brooklynite can never stay low long, especially when she can help a talented but reluctant boxer realize his real career dream while also sparring verbally and ultimately clinching romantically with the fighter's ambitious manager. Future U.S. senator George Murphy plays the manager. In the role of the boxer is Robert Sterling, heralded in the film's trailer as a nifty newcomer with a nifty manner. Sothern surely agreed, marrying Sterling in 1943.

• comedy