Showing posts with label 1932. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1932. Show all posts
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| Barbara Stanwyck and Regis Toomey |
Kitty Lane (Barbara Stanwyck), a girl from the wrong side of the tracks, winds up as a waitress in a literally greasy spoon where she meets David Livingstone (Regis Toomey). David wants to marry Kitty, but his termagant, selfish mother (Clara Blandick) refuses to countenance the idea of her son, who's studying to be a doctor, marrying a common waitress, and trumps up charges against her with the aid of an odious judge friend [it's quite satisfying watching Toomey give this creep a knock-out punch]. Years later Kitty has become a famous Broadway star, of course, and David comes calling ... can this love be rekindled and will mama allow it to happen? Stanwyck is fine in a Joan Crawford rags-to-riches role, and Toomey is very adept and appealing. The developments are unlikely, the script mediocre, but the stars manage to put it over if nothing else. Zazu Pitts plays yet another dithery friend of the heroine's. Blandick is fine as the mother from Hell. Toomey later did such TV shows as Shannon and Grinde directed a great many movies, including a few Boris Karloff thrillers such as The Man They Could Not Hang.
Verdict: Stanwyck is almost always watchable in anything and she's made worse. **.
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| Mary Astor and Kenneth MacKenna |
"It isn't wise to love anything so much that to lose it almost kills you."
Struggling novelist Freddie Williston (Kenneth MacKenna) meets May (Mary Astor) in the crowd during the Armistice Day celebration, and discovers that she's just bought a copy of his book. Before long they are married and a child is on the way, along with a string of bestsellers. Had Those We Love looked at the life of an unsuccessful or fair-to-middling author it might have had more dramatic heft, but once Freddie becomes a rich and famous author, the only complication that can be thrown into the couple's lives comes in the form of Valerie (Lilyan Tashman), a married vamp who has set her cap for Freddie. May jumps to conclusions about Val's relationship with her husband, and inadvertently makes matters worse. Will this family survive this crisis, and will Valerie go on her merry way? Those We Love manages to be entertaining because of the cast. Mary Astor is as wonderful as ever, while MacKenna has charm to spare. Tommy Conlon [The Sign of the Cross] is swell as their son, Ricky, who might be as wise as both of his parents. Virginia Sale [Lovin' the Ladies] scores as the maid Bertha, as does Tashman [One Heavenly Night] as the lynx-like (if not terribly beautiful) man-stealer, Valerie. From the first Freddie seems more interested in making money than in crafting lasting literature, so one can imagine his books are as superficial as he is. Those We Love misses virtually every opportunity to say anything about the writing life, the publishing business, or the creative process, and was adapted from a Broadway play. Florey directed The Beast with Five Fingers and many, many others.
Verdict: Fairly creaky, but the acting puts it over. **1/2.