A Star Is Born: The 1937 Original Still Bites

Is it worth your time?

If you like old Hollywood stuff that isn't afraid to be a little bit mean, you’ll dig this. People who hate black-and-white movies or get bored by dialogue-heavy scenes should probably skip it. It’s not exactly a barrel of laughs, but it hits harder than I expected.

Fredric March is the real deal here. His version of Norman Maine is just soggy with regret. You can see the exact moment he realizes he’s no longer the guy people care about. It’s not subtle, but it works.

Janet Gaynor as Esther/Vicki Lester is… well, she’s a lot. She’s got that wide-eyed sincerity that makes you want to root for her, even when the script pushes her into some really sappy corners. There’s a specific scene where she’s practicing her acting in a mirror that felt almost painfully awkward to watch. Like, leave the poor girl alone.

Random thoughts from the couch:

• The lighting in the party scenes makes everyone look slightly haunted.
• I forgot how much I enjoy watching old-school studio sets. It feels like a dollhouse made of cardboard and lighting rigs.
• The bit with the fan who just wants an autograph? Ouch. We've all seen that desperation before.

It’s funny to compare this to modern takes. It feels way less polished and more like a fever dream about what fame does to a person's insides. Sometimes the movie drags, especially when it tries to explain the 'business' of Hollywood, which feels like a lecture from a grandpa who watched too many newsreels.

I wouldn't call it a masterpiece, but it has a pulse. It’s not like The Doom of Darkness where everything is just gloom for the sake of it. This has a weird, sparkly kind of sadness that sticks to you.

The pacing gets really weird toward the end. It jumps from one emotional beat to another without catching its breath. Maybe that’s just how they made movies back then. Or maybe they were just running out of film stock. 🤷‍♂️

Anyway, keep your expectations modest. It’s not a shiny artifact. It’s just a sad story about two people who couldn't figure out how to be in the same room without one of them falling apart. Worth a watch, if only to see where the blueprint for every other version came from.