Now Over 5500 Reviews and (near) Daily Updates!

WELCOME! Use the search engines on this site (or your own off-site engine of choice) to gain easy access to the complete MAKSQUIBS Archive; more than 5500 posts and counting. (New posts added every day or so.)

You can check on all our titles by typing the Title, Director, Actor or 'Keyword' you're looking for in the Search Engine of your choice (include the phrase MAKSQUIBS) or just use the BLOGSPOT.com Search Box at the top left corner of the page.

Feel free to place comments directly on any of the film posts and to test your film knowledge with the CONTESTS scattered here & there. (Hey! No Googling allowed. They're pretty easy.)

Send E-mails to MAKSQUIBS@yahoo.com . (Let us know if the TRANSLATE WIDGET works!) Or use the Profile Page or Comments link for contact.

Thanks for stopping by.

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

STRONGER THEN DESIRE (1939)

M-G-M tried teaming Virginia Bruce & Walter Pidgeon on a pair of programmers in ‘39, but it didn’t take. Pidgeon went on to Greer Garson while Bruce just . . . went on. This second outing has Pidgeon as a society lawyer (the title of their first film) and Bruce now plays his devoted, but neglected wife. She goes in for a bit of flirting in an attempt to get even, but it backfires tragically when some harmless letters lead to a blackmail attempt; an accidentally fired gun; and a murder charge against the dead man’s unhappy wife (Ann Dvorak). Now, a guilt-ridden Bruce needs to coax her husband into taking on the case and giving up their long delayed European holiday. It’s a decent, if familiar, set-up, and there’s some nifty Agatha Christie-style twists in the final courtroom scenes. But the pathological accents needed to make Lee Bowman’s suave blackmailer a real threat are missing. Or rather, they’re given to Rita Johnson, the rich bitch Pidgeon defends in the opening reels. Her stalking routine, which Bruce misreads as a two-way affair, is the most interesting thing in here. (Johnson & Pidgeon co-starred that same year in Jacques Tourneur’s NICK CARTER.) Here, under the paceless megging of supporting actor turned journeyman director Leslie Fenton, even the normally vivid Ann Dvorak barely registers.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: The original SCARFACE/’32 keeps Dvorak’s name fitfully alive, but try THREE ON A MATCH/’32, alongside Bette Davis & Joan Blondell, to see her at her best.

No comments: