I Live My Life: Joan Crawford and the Archaeology of Romance

Is it worth your time?

Honestly, only if you have a soft spot for 1930s screwball energy or if you’re a completist for Joan Crawford’s mid-thirties run. It’s the kind of movie that feels like a pleasant afternoon spent in a very expensive, very crowded room. If you hate movies where people just talk in circles about their feelings while wearing tuxedos, skip it. You will probably find the whole thing a bit exhausting.

The Greece stuff at the start feels like a postcard. It’s shiny, it’s quick, and it’s clearly filmed on a soundstage that’s trying its absolute best to look like the Mediterranean. Joan Crawford is in her element here, playing the kind of rich girl who treats everyone like a toy until she meets Terry.

Brian Aherne is… well, he’s an archaeologist. He looks very serious in his dusty shirts. When he follows her back to New York, the movie shifts gears into this awkward comedy of manners. Watching him try to navigate her world of endless cocktail parties is like watching a cat try to walk on ice. He’s uncomfortable. I felt uncomfortable for him.

There is this one scene involving the grandmother, played by Jessie Ralph, that really steals the show. She’s the only one who seems to understand the absurdity of the situation. Everyone else is playing it straight, but she’s got this glint in her eye that makes you think she knows the script is a bit thin. She’s great.

Bits and bobs:

• The dialogue is snappy, but sometimes it’s *too* snappy. You can feel the writers trying to get to the next punchline before the last one has even landed.
• The pacing is frantic. It’s like the film is scared you’ll get bored if nobody is shouting or moving furniture for more than five minutes.
• The fashion is absurdly over-the-top, even for 1935. I think Crawford wears more silk in one hour than I’ve seen in my entire life.
• I kept thinking about Ella Cinders and how that movie felt so much more grounded despite being a total farce.

The final act, the whole "will they/won't they" wedding quarrel, drags a bit. It’s one of those scenes where you just want to reach into the screen and shake them. Just talk to each other! But then you remember this is a movie from that era, and if they actually talked, the credits would roll at the twenty-minute mark. So, we get the argument. It’s loud. It’s dramatic. It’s fine.

It’s not a masterpiece, but it’s not a chore either. Sometimes you just want to watch people in nice clothes be miserable in expensive houses. This movie delivers that in spades. 🥂