Gefährliche Liebe

A very fast and enjoyable, early Bette Davis movie. She won her first Academy Award nomination and win for this movie, many believe for being overlooked the previous year for her performance in Of Human Bondage. I've seen both and happen to think that the Bondage performance is very overdone (as much as I love her she over acts often) and this performance in Dangerous is deeper and more reserved and yet is still just as riveting, with plenty of scenes for Davis to rip into. Definately worth checking out.

The aristocratic architect Don Bellows (Franchot Tone) worships the former successful actress Joyce Heath (Bette Davis), who prematurely left the stage considered a jinx, for changing his life for better. When Don goes with his fiancée Gail Armitage (Margaret Lindsay) and a friend to a bar, he sees Joyce completely drunken and penniless, and he takes her to his house in the countryside. Joyce stays there for a period in rehabilitation, and Don falls in love with her and calls off his engagement with Gail. Don also decides to produce a play for her and to get married with Joyce after the opening night. But Joyce has a secret in her past that will affect their lives forever.

"Dangerous" is a melodramatic movie with a great story but a corny conclusion, with Joyce Heath returning to her crippled husband. Bette Davis has a great performance and won her first Oscar of Best Actress. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Perigosa" ("Dangerous")

Bette Davis plays the "femme fatale" as no other actress before or since. Every scene she plays gives us a riveting performance even though at times we may think it a trifle theatrical. In "Dangerous" she plays the role of Joyce Heath, a great actress, yearning for love which is denied to her. Her frantic outbursts make life for those around her difficult to comprehend. Desperate situations require desperate remedies and in a fit of madness Joyce Heath decides to resolve her difficulties in her own dangerous way.

The ending may appear rather glib but the actors themselves give performances not to be missed and Bette Davis is a worthy recipient of an Academy Award.

Bette Davis plays a down and out actress who believes she curses everyone she becomes involved with in "Dangerous," one of Davis' Oscar-winning performances.

It is in this film and the earlier "Of Human Bondage" that the Davis image really solidifies - high energy, strong, smoking, and smokin'. If she seems at times a little over the top, it can be attributed to the acting style of those days, which was a carryover from the stage.

What Davis gives is very much a stage performance - with the invention of talkies, the studios raided the theater for actors who could speak, and Bette Davis was among them. Over the years, with the advent of television, acting has become more intimate, more natural, and Davis' complaint about the newer approach was that it can also be boring. She never was.

Davis costars in this film with Franchot Tone, who plays an architect that brings the Davis character out of the gutter, only to find himself face down in it himself. Smooth and classy, he's the type of leading man that one doesn't see anymore, and he's a good romantic lead for her.

The lovely Margaret Lindsay is Tone's discarded fiancé, and there's a wonderful performance by Alison Skipworth as Tone's housekeeper.

Davis, of course, draws all of the focus, with the fire in her eyes, the bite in her voice, and those flashes of vulnerability. She was always a fascinating screen presence, and she won't disappoint you in "Dangerous." "Dangerous" is a little bit dated, but what isn't, 70 years later.

So let her be flamboyant, if she wants to be. She had audiences riveted to their seats in 1935 with this strong performance.

How remarkable today, in 2000, that this 65-year-old portrayl can still hypnotize. It is solid Bette Davis work, with Franchot Tone lending fine support in every scene.

This legendary actress may chew a bit of scenery here and there, but then that's what makes her work so distinctive: here's a real personality, a star, who puts it all out there. She doesn't apologize either. . . just let's it all hang out and, if you like it, fine--if not, tis no big deal. She seems to have been a born actress, too -- with her style the opposite of the Method. Go on and indicate emotion when you're not up to drawing a sincere response. Keep folks wondering where the real Davis begins and the posing one leaves off. You're so good a what you do, you don't need to worry. . . your fans will lap it up anyway.

Which they did, by the millions. Davis was recently voted the number one film actress of the 20th century in a popular poll by moviegoers. That speaks legions about how her work, after all these years, is still regarded. ###