Oh. Mary Pickford's first talking film, a box office hit, an Oscar winner, an instant classic and totally annoying. Besides being a plain and rather lame adaptation of the play, this is one of those movies made to display Pickford and Pickford alone, giving the audience no rest from the extremely whiny Norma. The secondary characters have so few lines each, that they are unable to balance her out and sort of just fade into the backround. Even Norma's love interest and his rival are written to be forgotten, and the short smiles brought on by Jimmy and Julia are quickly clouded by Norma again when Pickford reclaims the limelight. There was a lot of care put into the production of this movie, and it is part of the big transition from silent to talking pictures, featuring a huge star and filmed in an iconic studio. This is a historically significant film, and there are many technical reasons to watch it, but all of those still do not make this a pleasant experience. That is not to say Pickford didn't transition well - I quite enjoyed The Taming of the Shrew, for example -, only that this particular piece just isn't a very good one.
Review by C. S. C.BlockedParent2017-07-08T11:23:17Z
Oh. Mary Pickford's first talking film, a box office hit, an Oscar winner, an instant classic and totally annoying. Besides being a plain and rather lame adaptation of the play, this is one of those movies made to display Pickford and Pickford alone, giving the audience no rest from the extremely whiny Norma. The secondary characters have so few lines each, that they are unable to balance her out and sort of just fade into the backround. Even Norma's love interest and his rival are written to be forgotten, and the short smiles brought on by Jimmy and Julia are quickly clouded by Norma again when Pickford reclaims the limelight.
There was a lot of care put into the production of this movie, and it is part of the big transition from silent to talking pictures, featuring a huge star and filmed in an iconic studio. This is a historically significant film, and there are many technical reasons to watch it, but all of those still do not make this a pleasant experience. That is not to say Pickford didn't transition well - I quite enjoyed The Taming of the Shrew, for example -, only that this particular piece just isn't a very good one.