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Carole Lombard, Shirley Temple, and Gary Cooper in “Now and Forever” (1934)

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Carole Lombard, Shirley Temple, and Gary Cooper in “Now and Forever” (1934)

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Now and Forever (1934)

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Now and Forever (1934)

Carefree, irresponsible Jerry Day (Gary Cooper) and his second wife, Toni (Carole Lombard), are running up a bill at a Shanghai hotel that Jerry has no means to pay. Jerry hatches a scheme to swindle other guests to get money to pay his hotel bill and the two escape to the next leg of their foreign vacation. Desperate for more cash, Jerry is willing to sell the custody rights of his 5-year-old daughter Penelope from his first marriage, known as Penny (Shirley Temple), whom he has never met, to his former brother-in-law. Toni is shocked and goes by herself to Paris, while Cooper meets his daughter and is captivated by her, deciding to retain custody after all. Penny and Jerry arrive in Paris to be reunited with Toni, who will now play her mother. After selling a nonexistent gold mine to Felix Evans (Sir Guy Standing), a man who turns out to be much more versed in the art of swindling than he, Jerry decides to re-enter the workforce as a real estate salesman, but is not very successful. Soon he finds himself in need of cash to support himself, Penny and Toni.

Jerry meets up again with Evans, who had paid with a phony check, and Evans convinces Jerry to steal a valuable necklace from Mrs. Crane (Charlotte Granville), a rich lady Penny has befriended. Mrs. Crane tells Jerry that she wants to adopt Penny, and offers to throw a party for her. During the party, Jerry spots one of Mrs. Crane's expensive necklaces lying out on her dresser and steals it, hiding it in Penny's teddy bear. The police are called and all the guests are searched but the necklace is not found. When Penny is put to bed, she cuddles her teddy bear and discovers the necklace hidden inside. She asks Jerry if he stole it and he says no. To get her to stop crying, Toni tells Penny that it was she who took the necklace so really Jerry was telling the truth. Penny is again satisfied that her father did not lie.

Jerry brings the necklace to Evans to resell it, but starts feeling guilty when Penny throws all her faith and love towards Jerry for being honest. He goes back to try to recover the necklace and threatens Evans with a gun; Evans shoots back and wounds Jerry, but Jerry kills Evans. Jerry returns the necklace to Mrs. Crane, who agrees to lie that the necklace was not stolen at all, but mislaid. Mrs. Crane then takes Penny off to boarding school, while Jerry, suffering from his untreated gunshot wound, and Toni say goodbye to her. Though Jerry does not want to go to a doctor lest the police be involved, he collapses as he tries to get back in the car and Toni takes him to a hospital. Lying in a hospital bed with a police officer standing nearby, Jerry ruminates that it is not so bad coming clean after all.

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Robert Montgomery and Carole Lombard

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Carole Lombard

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Carole Lombard

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