A Woman Commands (1932) - Creaky, Weird, and Kind of Fun

If you are looking for a flawless masterpiece, you should probably keep walking. But if you have a soft spot for dusty, slightly creaky early talkies where everyone acts with their entire face, you might actually dig this. 🎬

It is basically about a soldier played by Basil Rathbone, way before his Sherlock Holmes days, who goes totally broke trying to keep his fancy mistress, Maria.

Then his commanding officer gets a wild idea to fix the whole debt situation, which involves some royal matchmaking. It is all very dramatic and very, very silly.

First off, Pola Negri is a whole mood in this movie. Her accent is so thick you could cut it with a butter knife, and she sings this song called "Paradise" that is honestly kind of catchy in a ghostly way. 🎤

She has this habit of staring directly at the camera like she is trying to hypnotize the audience through the screen. It almost works.

The whole movie has that weird, stiff feeling of 1932. It does not have the slick, fast pacing of The Divorcee or the gritty noise of The Big House.

Instead, characters just stand in massive, empty-looking rooms and talk very loudly at each other. You can actually hear their shoes squeaking on the studio floor sometimes.

I kind of love that kind of stuff, honestly. It makes the movie feel like watching a high school play that somehow got a massive Hollywood budget.

Basil Rathbone looks incredibly handsome here but also like he wants to punch the director. His jawline is doing most of the heavy lifting in his scenes.

And then there is Roland Young playing the King. He is easily the best part of the whole thing.

He plays the King like a guy who just wants to go take a nice nap instead of ruling a country. His quiet, sarcastic energy is a hilarious contrast to all the screaming going on around him.

There is this one scene where an angry mob is supposed to be rioting, but they just look like they are waiting in a very disorganized line at a grocery store.

One guy in the back is literally just waving his hat at nothing. I could not stop watching him.

Is the story logical? Not even a little bit.

But the melodrama is so thick you can practically smell the vintage stage makeup. It is a neat little time capsule if you are into that sort of thing.