"LITTLE WOMEN" (1933) Review

 

"LITTLE WOMEN" (1933) Review

There have been many adaptations of Louisa May Alcott's 1868-69 best-selling two-volume novel, "Little Women". And I mean many adaptations - on stage and in movies and television. I have personally seen three television adaptations and four movie adaptations. One of the most famous versions of Alcott's novel is the 1933 movie adaptation, produced by Merian C. Cooper and directed by George Cukor.

Although I have seen at four adaptations more than once, I had just watched this version for the very first time. Judging from the reviews and articles I have read, Cukor's "LITTLE WOMEN" seemed to be the benchmark that all other versions are based upon. So, you could imagine my anticipation about this film before watching it. How did I feel about "LITTLE WOMEN"? That would require a complicated answer.

"LITTLE WOMEN" told the story of the four March sisters of Concord, Massachusetts - Margaret (Meg), Josephine (Jo), Elizabeth (Beth) and Amy - during and after the U.S. Civil War. Since second daughter Jo is the main character, the story focuses on her relationships with her three other sisters, her parents (especially her mother "Marmee"), the sisters' Aunt March, and the family's next-door neighbors, Mr. James Laurence and his grandson Theodore ("Laurie"). Although each sister experiences some kind of coming-of-age throughout the story, the movie focuses on Jo's development through her relationship with Laurie and a German immigrant she meets in New York City after the war, the charming and older Professor Friedrich Bhaer. Jo and her sisters deal with the anxiety of their father's involvement in the Civil War, genteel poverty, scarlet fever, wanted and unwanted romance, and Jo's fear of dealing the family breaking apart as she and her sisters grow older.

I must saw that the production values for "LITTLE WOMEN" were certainly top-notch. One has to credit producer Merian C. Cooper in gathering a team of excellent artists to re-create 1860s Massachusetts and New York for the movie. I was especially impressed by Van Nest Polglase's art direction, Sydney Moore and Ray Moyer's set decorations and art direction team of Hobe Erwin, George Peckham, and Charles Sayers. However, I simply have to single out Walter Plunkett's excellent costume designs for the film. I doubt very much that Plunkett's costumes were an accurate depiction of 1860s fashion, I believe he came close enough. Plunkett's career also included work for 1939's "GONE WITH THE WIND", "RAINTREE COUNTY", from 1957 and the 1949 version of "Little Women". I suspect that this film marked his debut for designing costumes for the mid-19th century. I did have a problem with the hairstyles worn by three of the four leads. A good deal of early 1930s hairstyles seemed to have been used - with the exception of the short bob. At least three of the actresses wore bangs . . . a lot. Bangs were not popular with 19th century women until the late 1870s and the 1880s.

Until the release of the 2019 film, George Cukor's adaptation of Alcott's novel has been considered the best by many film critics. Do I agree with this assessment? Well, I cannot deny that I had enjoyed watching "LITTLE WOMEN". One, producer Merian C. Cooper and director George Cukor did an excellent job in their selection of the cast - especially the four actresses who portrayed the March sisters. All four had excellent chemistry. The movie's portrayal of the U.S. Civil War and the years that followed it immediately struck me as pretty solid. And although there were moments when the film threatened to border on saccharine, I must admit that Cukor and the screenplay written by Victor Heerman and Sarah Y. Mason kept both the narrative and the film's pacing very lively. And finally, I enjoyed how the movie depicted Jo's friendship and romance with Professor Friedrich Bhaer. I found it warm, charming, romantic and more importantly . . . not rushed.

However, I do have a few issues with "LITTLE WOMEN". There were times when the movie, especially during its first half hour, seemed in danger of wallowing in saccharine. I get it. Alcott had portrayed the Marches as a warm and close-knit family. But Alcott had included minor conflicts and personality flaws in the family's portrait as well. It seemed as if director George Cukor, along with screenwriters Sarah Y. Mason and Victor Heerman were determined to whitewash this aspect of Alcott's novel as much as possible. This whitewashing led to the erasure of one novel's best sequences - namely Amy March's burning of Jo's manuscript in retaliation for an imagined slight, Amy's conflict with her schoolteacher, the development of Amy and Laurie's relationship in Europe, and Meg's conflict Aunt March over her relationship with tutor John Brooke. These deletions took a lot out of Alcott's story. It amazes me to this day that so many film critics have willingly overlooked this. Do not get me wrong. "LITTLE WOMEN" remained an entertaining film. But in erasing these aspects of Alcott's story, Cukor and the two screenwriters came dangerously close to sucking some of the life out of this film. Ironically, Mason and Heerman repeated their mistake in MGM's 1949 adaption with the same results.

Most critics and movie fans tend to praise Katherine Hepburn's portrayal of Jo March to the sky. In fact, many critics and film historians to this day have claimed Hepburn proved to be the best Jo out of all the actresses who have portrayed the character. Do I agree? No. Although I admired Hepburn's performance in the movie's second half, I found her portrayal of the adolescent Jo in the first half to be a mixed bag. There were times when I admired her spirited performance. There were other times when said performance came off as a bit too strident for my tastes. I honestly do not know what to say about Frances Dee's performance as Meg March. My problem is that I did not find her portrayal that memorable. I barely remember Dee's performance, if I must be honest. I cannot say the same about Joan Bennett's portrayal of the youngest March sibling, Amy. Mind you, Bennett never received the chance to touch upon Amy's less pleasant side of her nature. And it is a pity that the screenplay failed to give Bennett the opportunity to portray Amy's growing maturity in the film's second half. But I have to admit that as a woman who was roughly three years younger than Hepburn, she gave a more subtle performance as a pre-teen and adolescent Amy, than Hepburn did as the teenaged Jo. The one performance that really impressed me came from Jean Parker's portrayal of Beth March, the family's shyest member. I thought Parker did an excellent job of conveying Beth's warmth, fear of being in public and the long, slow death the character had suffered following a deadly bout of scarlet fever.

I can honestly say that Mrs. "Marmee" March would never be considered as one of my favorite Spring Byington roles. Mind you, the actress gave a competent performance as the March family's matriarch. However, there were times when she seemed too noble, good or too ideal for me to regard her as a human being. As is the case in most, if not all versions of "LITTLE WOMEN", the Mr. March character barely seemed alive . . . especially after he returned home from the war. I cannot blame actor Samuel S. Hinds, who portrayed. I blame the screenwriters for their failure to do the character any justice. On the other hand, I did enjoy Henry Stephenson's portrayal of the complicated, yet likeable Mr. Laurence. I enjoyed how Stephenson managed to slowly, but surely reveal the warm human being behind the aloof facade. Edna May Oliver gave a very lively performance as the irascible, yet wealthy Aunt March. In fact, I would go as far to say that her performance had breathed a great deal of fresh air into the production. Not many critics were impressed by Douglass Montgomery's portrayal of the March sisters' closes friend, Theodore "Laurie" Laurence. I can honestly say that I do not share their opinion. Frankly, I felt more than impressed by his portrayal of the cheeky, yet emotional Laurie. I thought he gave one of the film's better performances - especially in one scene Laurie reacted to Jo's rejection of his marriage proposal. I thought Montgomery did an excellent job of reacting emotionally to Jo's rejection, without going over the top. I also enjoyed Paul Lukas' interpretation of Professor Bhaer. There were moments when his performance threatened to get a little hammy. But the actor managed to reign in his excesses - probably more so than Hepburn. And he gave a warm and charming performance as the romantic Professor Bhaer.

Yes, I have some issues with this adaptation of "LITTLE WOMEN". If I must be honest, most of my issues are similar to my issues with the 1949 adaptation. This should not be surprising, since both movies were written by the same screenwriters - Sarah Y. Mason and Victor Heerman. However . . . like the 1949 movie, this "LITTLE WOMEN" adaptation proved to be a solid and entertaining adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's novel. One can thank Mason and Heerman, director George Cukor and the fine cast led by the talented Katherine Hepburn.

"LITTLE WOMEN" (1933) Photo Gallery

 

Below are images from "LITTLE WOMEN", the 1933 adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's 1868-69 novel. Directed by George Cukor, the Oscar nominated film starred Katherine Hepburn, Joan Bennett, Frances Dee, Jean Parker and Douglass Montgomery:




"LITTLE WOMEN" (1933) Photo Gallery

"BECKY SHARP" (1935) Review

"BECKY SHARP" (1935) Review

Being something of a film history buff, I have been aware of the 1935 adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's 1847-48 novel, "Vanity Fair" for a number of years. But I have never been inclined to watch the film, until recently. 

I cannot say what led to my recent interest in "BECKY SHARP". But it was a book on David O. Selznick that made me first aware of the 1935 film. John Hay "Jock" Whitney and Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney had founded Pioneer Pictures in 1933 as a means to produce color movies. "Jock" Whitney was close friends with Selznick. He even co-financed Selznick's production company, Selznick International, in 1935. Between the creations of Pioneer Pictures and Selznick International, the former released the first feature-length film to use the three-strip Technicolor process. "BECKY SHARP" is the sixth of eleven film and/or television adaptations of the Thackeray's novel. It is the first in color.

"BECKY SHARP" took its title from the novel's main character, a poor, but educated young English lady who struggles rise in the ranks of Britain's social classes during the early years of the 19th century. Becky Sharp is the orphaned daughter of an English painter and French dancer, who graduates from Miss Pinkerton's Academy for Young Ladies with a friend named Amelia Sedley. Since Amelia is the daughter of a wealthy merchant, Becky manipulates her way into her friend's household, where she meets Amelia's portly and jovial brother, Joseph "Jos" Sedley. Before Becky can sink her hooks into Jos, the Sedley patriarch put an end to the budding "romance" by sending Jos away to India. Meanwhile, Becky finds employment as a governess at the estate of Sir Pitt Crawley. She eventually wins the heart and hand of Crawley's playboy son Rawdon, an officer in the British army. When news of Napoleon Bonaparte's escape from Elba reach Britain, Becky is reunited with Amelia, who has now married her childhood sweetheart George Osborne. The two women's husbands and William Dobbin are deployed to Belgium to face Napoleon's Army. But the last stages of the Napoleonic Wars proved to be the first of many crisis thrown Becky's way. 

Judging from the movie's title, it is clear to me that screenwriter Francis Edward Faragoh had deleted a great deal of Thackeray's novel in order to write a screenplay with a running time of eighty-four minutes. I found it odd that a film adaptation of such a famous epic novel would have such a short running time. Other epics and movie adaptations of literary works had running times that sometimes went past two hours - including "A TALE OF TWO CITIES", "MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY", "THE CRUSADES", and "CAPTAIN BLOOD". I can only assume that a minor and newly formed production company like Pioneer Pictures could not afford to produce the first Technicolor feature film with a running time close to or over two hours. If that was the case . . . if the Whitneys were that determined to produce the first full-featured movie in color . . . they could have chosen something that was not an adaptation of a famous epic novel. I find it ironic that Mina Nair's 2004 adaptation of Thackeray's novel had received a great deal of criticism for not being truly faithful to its source. I have encountered less criticism of "BECKY SHARP" than I did for the 2004 film. Yet, the latter is more faithful than the former. One of my problems with "BECKY SHARP" is that I thought the producers, director Rouben Mamoulian and screenwriter Francis Edward Faragoh did a piss poor job of adapting Thackery's novel to the screen. I just learned that the 1935 movie is actually an adaptation of Langdon Elwyn Mitchell's 1899 play, which was an adaptation of the 1847-48 novel. I hate to say this, but the movie's running time of eighty-four (84) minutes did not serve the story. 

There is so much in "BECKY SHARP" that was left out. Most of the narrative that focused upon Amelia was deleted, especially her fractious relationship with her father-in-law, Mr. Osborne. In fact, George's father never made an appearance in this film. I suspect the same could be said about Mitchell's play. The only time the movie focused upon Amelia's character arc was when Becky was personally involved . . . namely George's infatuation with Becky before the Waterloo battle and Becky forcing Amelia to face the truth about George in the movie's last fifteen to twenty minutes. It is not surprising that the movie's title was based upon the main character's name. Not only was much of Amelia's personal story deleted, the movie also rushed through Becky's stay with the Sedley and Crawley families. It seemed as if Mamoulian and Faragoh could not wait to focus on the impact of Waterloo and the marriage between Becky and Rawdon. Between the handling of Amelia's character arc and the rushed narrative in the movie's first half, it is no wonder that I found "BECKY SHARP" particularly unsatisfying.

I found other aspects of "BECKY SHARP" unsatisfying. The sound and visual quality of the movie's DVD version low in quality. The photography and color struck me as faded. And the sound is scratchy. For once, I am not blaming the movie's filmmakers. Whoever had possession of "BECKY SHARP" after Pioneer Pictures had failed to maintain its original quality. But I can blame the filmmakers on other aspects of the movie. In it, the Jos Sedley character returned to Europe with a little Indian boy in tow as his personal servant. Only the "Indian servant" was portrayed by a young African-American actor named Jimmy Robinson. To this day, I am still trying to figure out how the producers and director Rouben Mamoulian saw nothing wrong in an African-American kid portraying an Indian kid. Hollywood's casting for non-white characters seemed really skewed in this film. And then . . . there was the acting.

I am surprised that "BECKY SHARP" led to a Best Actress Oscar nomination for actress Miriam Hopkins. Granted, she handled the character's questionable morality, desperation and charm very well. Yet, Hopkins engaged in so much hammy acting that I found myself wondering why of all her performances, she ended up earning a nomination for this particular one. I wish I could say that the rest of the cast gave better performances . . . but I cannot. Other cast members gave equally hammy performances. Nigel Bruce, Alan Mowbray, Alison Skipworth, G.P. Huntley and many others were equally hammy. I could not accuse Colin Tapley of hamminess on the same scale. But I found his portrayal of William Dobbin rather dramatic. And I am not being complimentary. The only cast members who actually impressed me were Frances Dee and Cedrick Hardwicke. Dee gave a surprisingly subtle and convincing performance as the sweet and passive Amelia Sedley. Thanks to Dee's performances, audiences saw both the positive and negative aspects of Amelia's passiveness. Hardwicke was equally subtle as Becky's aristocratic "benefactor", the Marquis of Steyne. Even though Steyne is an unlikable character, Hardwicke was no mustache-twirling villain. 

The only reason I would recommend "BECKY SHARP" to anyone is for historical purposes. Because this is the first feature-length motion picture in color, I would recommend this movie to any film buff. Otherwise, I would stay clear of "BECKY SHARP" and consider other adaptations of William Makepeace Thackery's novel.

"BECKY SHARP" (1935) Photo Gallery

Below are images from "BECKY SHARP", the 1935 adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's 1847-48 novel, "Vanity Fair". Directed by Rouben Mamoulian, the movie starred Miriam Hopkins in the title role: 


"BECKY SHARP" (1935) Photo Gallery