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Cult Review
Senior Film Conservator
Honestly? Only if you have a weird itch to see how they handled 'scandalous' behavior in 1931 without actually showing anything. If you dig old Hollywood relics, you might get a kick out of the set designs. If you’re looking for something that holds up as a piece of actual storytelling, you’ll probably hate it. It’s slow, it’s stiff, and it drags its feet for nearly every minute of the runtime.
June Collyer is doing the heavy lifting here, and you can practically see her trying to find the humanity in a script that gives her basically nothing to work with. She’s trapped in a plot that feels like it was written by committee. Or maybe by someone who hadn't spoken to a real human in a few years. 🙄
There’s a scene about midway through where a character delivers a monologue that is so stiff I thought the actor might literally snap in half. It’s supposed to be this big, emotional turning point. Instead, it’s just awkward. It feels like watching a high school play where someone forgot their line and decided to just shout the rest of it.
The pacing is all over the place. Sometimes the movie rushes through life-changing events like it’s checking off a grocery list. Then, it slows to a crawl over a conversation about tea or some other mundane nonsense. It reminds me a bit of the pacing issues in The Third Alarm, where the dramatic beats just don't land because the movie is too busy being formal.
It’s not as interesting as The Cat and the Fiddle, which at least had a bit of a pulse. This just feels like a studio project churned out to keep the cameras moving. Sometimes the camera lingers on a doorway for so long after a character exits that you start to wonder if they’re ever coming back. They never do.
It’s a dusty old film. If you’re a completionist, go for it. Otherwise, you’re not missing a masterpiece. 🎬
Year
1931
IMDb Rating
—
Editorial
Deciphering the legacy of transgressive cult cinema.
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