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Reviews2
erinh's rating
As noted in most of the reviews here, Carole Lombard is remarkable in this unique screwball comedy. Although she plays the part of a chronic liar, she brings it off such charm and humor that it's easy to see why her husband, a self-described "stickler for honesty", tolerates her excesses.
I watched this movie without knowing anything about it before-hand (I'd never heard of it, actually), and I'm glad I knew nothing going in. The plot is surprising, with Carole's character spinning her webs and sending events in strange and unexpected directions. So this won't be much of a review: please watch this movie. If you have any fondness for this genre, you'll probably be pleasantly surprised.
I watched this movie without knowing anything about it before-hand (I'd never heard of it, actually), and I'm glad I knew nothing going in. The plot is surprising, with Carole's character spinning her webs and sending events in strange and unexpected directions. So this won't be much of a review: please watch this movie. If you have any fondness for this genre, you'll probably be pleasantly surprised.
Aside from the silly and gratuitous underwear scene, this movie does a good job of telling the story of poor Ruth Brock, a hard-working, put-upon small town girl who is judged and persecuted by her neighbors and so-called friends following a day of fun on an eponymous 'Hot Saturday' in the summer of 1932.
Subsequent events show how much women had staked on maintaining their reputations at that time, a topic that didn't go away with the enforcement of the production code though it lost a lot of its nuance. The expression on Ruth's face in the last frame of this film is so uncertain...she doesn't know if she's doing the right thing, doesn't know quite what she's getting into. I grieve for the loss of that ambiguity in films made in the years to come.
Nancy Carroll is brilliant in the role of Ruth, sparing the audience tedious hysterics and instead portraying the bitterness and frustration of living in a town of petty fools with nothing better to do than tear each other apart. I sort of wish there were two versions of this movie, one starring Carroll and one starring Barbara Stanwyck so I could do a side-by-side comparison. Stanwyck did such a good job with offended righteousness in 'Night Nurse'. But I'd keep Cary Grant in both...young and perfectly cast in the role of the local "disreputable cad" (that's how he's described (aptly) on the label).
But even a disreputable cad can have good points...and keen-eyed, truthful, pre-production code Ruth won't fail to notice them...
Subsequent events show how much women had staked on maintaining their reputations at that time, a topic that didn't go away with the enforcement of the production code though it lost a lot of its nuance. The expression on Ruth's face in the last frame of this film is so uncertain...she doesn't know if she's doing the right thing, doesn't know quite what she's getting into. I grieve for the loss of that ambiguity in films made in the years to come.
Nancy Carroll is brilliant in the role of Ruth, sparing the audience tedious hysterics and instead portraying the bitterness and frustration of living in a town of petty fools with nothing better to do than tear each other apart. I sort of wish there were two versions of this movie, one starring Carroll and one starring Barbara Stanwyck so I could do a side-by-side comparison. Stanwyck did such a good job with offended righteousness in 'Night Nurse'. But I'd keep Cary Grant in both...young and perfectly cast in the role of the local "disreputable cad" (that's how he's described (aptly) on the label).
But even a disreputable cad can have good points...and keen-eyed, truthful, pre-production code Ruth won't fail to notice them...