The Age of Consent 1932

Mike Harvey Richard Cromwell and Betty Cameron Dorothy Wilson are college sweethearts at a New York college, full of plans and passion. They grow impatient to take a bigger step and discuss quitting school, marrying, and heading to California where a friend has offered Mike a job. Their mentor and guide, Prof. David Mathews John Halliday, along with Betty, tempers the impulse, urging patience and responsibility rather than a quick rush to matrimony. Still, the idea plants a restless seed in Mike, and he ends up venting his frustrations in a local diner, trying to make sense of the conflicting advice and his own desires.

Dora Swale [Arline Judge] is a waitress who has long harbored a crush on Mike. After her late shift, she asks him to walk her home, and the two share a tense, intimate moment at her house. Dora’s father, Mr. Swale [Reginald Barlow], is away for the night, and a bottle of liquor hidden by the family becomes part of the reckless mood. The pair drink, kiss, and end up spending the night together. Dawn breaks with a sense of guilt and confusion, and Dora asks Mike whether he regrets what happened. Her father arrives, witnesses the disheveled scene, and, shaken by what he sees and the implication of the relationship, has Mike arrested for corrupting the morals of a minor.

Matthews moves quickly to intervene, and with Dora and her father in tow, Mike is bailed out but confronted with a stark choice in the District Attorney’s office: marry Dora or face charges. Despite Matthews’s efforts to shield him, Dora’s father insists on the marriage, and Mike agrees to the plan. The idea is to marry that very night and flee to California. In the meantime, Mike visits Betty, who has suddenly decided she wants to leave college to marry him right away. He explains that he must marry someone to do the right thing, and Betty, overwhelmed by their undeniable love, becomes distraught and suggests they run away together. A classmate, Duke Galloway [Eric Linden], tries to lift Betty’s spirits with a ride to ease the pain, but the weight of the expected sacrifice hangs heavy.

Back at Dora’s house, the mood shifts again. Dora appears in a white outfit, signaling her readiness to marry Mike and leave for California. Matthews stands up for Mike, but the preacher’s arrival is interrupted when Matthews is summoned away to the hospital, taking Mike with him, while Dora and her father trail behind.

At the hospital, a tragedy unfolds. Duke Galloway has a serious car accident, leaving Betty badly injured and Duke dead on arrival. Dora sees the truth illuminated by the pain of the moment: she cannot stand in the way of the genuine love between Mike and Betty. She tells her father that she will not marry Mike after all, recognizing how deeply he loves Betty.

The film closes with a hopeful turn: Mike and Betty are shown as a married couple, traveling together on a train toward California, their future shaped by hard choices, moral tests, and the undeniable bond that brought them back to one another.