ON BORROWED TIME (1939) Death plays brinksmanship

Both because my mother acted in it on stage and because I saw the film version at an early, impressionable age, I’m soft on the spectacularly schmaltzy ON BORROWED TIME, starring Lionel Barrymore and Bobs Watson (yes, that’s Bobs with an “s" who played the same role in countless ‘30s/’40s movies and could cry on a dime). Doomed to death but wishing to buy extra time to raise his grandson, "Gramps" traps the Grim Reaper (called Mr. Brink) up an apple tree, but things don't work out quite the way he planned. Mr. Brink is played with slippery charm by British stage actor Cedric Hardwicke, one of the great character actors in the first decades of the talking picture.