After Tomorrow

"Back Street" brought down to roaches, clinging 'n swinging moms and basement cold water flats! Depression Dirge Tune: "All the world will smile again. Dialogue punctuated by the "Aw! Gees! and "Swells" vocabulary of that inchoate time. Grace notes: Clinging mom's Wedding Gift: a bra wafted aloft. Silver plated wedding gift (for 4) from co-workers. Nostalgic Notes: Doctor conveniently across tenement street. No Radio! No fans!No fridge! Surprises: Anti-smoking message and barely chaste lovers. Ending: Erotic Niagara Falls. Better than North by Northwest but in the tradition of "Our Daily Bread", the"Crowd" and "Beggars of Life".

In Frank Borzage's monumental -and absolutely extraordinary- filmography,"After tomorrow" is the follow up to "Young America" and with hindsight,it made sense.The 1931 work dealt with the wall between the kids and the adults;"After tomorrow" deals with the problems of a young couple whose mothers are either selfish (the girl) or over possessive (the boy).It's the generation gap all over again.

Sid's mother feels that that time is passing her by:the first time we've seen it,she yells "don't call me mother!" .She can't stand her daughter anymore,which is the living proof that she's getting old ;leaving her old husband the day her daughter marries does not make feel her ill-at-ease .This scene when papa refuses the dough is thoroughly Borzagesque.

Peter's momma is afraid of the dark,and she needs her dear one to sleep the sleep of the just.She's not really nasty but her soon-to-be daughter-in-law is an enemy .Her presence is almost a comic relief,in a story which verges on dramatic.

Marian Nixon and Charles Farell ,Borzage's favorite actor manage to stay very natural,which was not that easy in the years following the silent age.They are wonderful in the scene of the hat after the job interview.

One of Borzage's finest movies?Probably not,but even the "OK" movies of this great man are so much better than so many other directors' best.

Excellent early talking picture with loads of "pre-code" racy language and situations, scandalous behavior, and a genuinely touching romance between Charles Farrell and Marian Nixon. Don't be fooled into thinking this is just another light romance. The terrific dialog is often surprisingly frank, especially when Minna Gombell -- in the performance of her life -- tells her daughter things no child should hear from a parent. Even 75 years later, that scene is genuinely shocking. All the parts are well acted, but a particular standout is Josephine Hull; her scenes with William Collier Sr. are absolutely hilarious. Direction by Frank Borzage is, as usual, nearly flawless. This film really should be much better known.

This is an intimate portrayal of ordinary people during the Depression struggling against lack of money, wayward and selfish parents, inability to get married (waiting for four years to have enough money), and many vicissitudes of everyday life which are often extremely harrowing. The characters are all 'extraordinarily ordinary', meaning that there is nothing at all remarkable about any of them, none is particularly bright, none has much ambition, and the heroine's one aim in life is to get married to her totally uninteresting boyfriend, who never takes his hat off when he is engaging in intimate conversations with her and has nothing to recommend him, not even a bit of charm. Marian Nixon is a frail, squeaky-voiced but delightfully innocent actress who plays the heroine. She has eyes too wide apart, but she loves her man, loves her man, loves her man. It is very touching because she really means it. Her performance is entirely convincing. Her mother, played by Minna Gombell, is embittered, hard, selfish, and disloyal, but Marian is such a goodie goodie she never even notices. William Collier Senior is an excellent father for Marian, gentle, loving, but hopeless because he has lost all initiative. This is not a film to see to cheer oneself up, but it is an honest and sensitive social drama which is well made and of great interest as a period piece. It is remarkably lacking in any trace of affectation, and being pre-code, it is unrestrained by the ludicrous restrictions soon to be placed on dialogue and action in Hollywood. The title 'after tomorrow' refers to the fact that everything is being deferred to tomorrow because of poverty, and 'after tomorrow' is the dream when it all might have happened. The script has a lot of wit. The direction is good. Charles Farrell plays the boyfriend, and he is really so uninteresting in every respect, looks, character, aspirations, that how anyone could be in love with him is a mystery. So maybe this is a new kind of mystery film: how people who are so ordinary that making a film about them seems an impossibility nevertheless make us want to watch them enacting their difficult lives. Probably the best performance in the film is by Josephine Hull, whose well-rounded portrayal of an infinitely exasperating and despicably selfish and self-indulgent mother of the boyfriend is a triumph of the dramatic art. The rapid oscillations in her moods, her alternating endearments and curses, her rudderless cascade of self obsession, are portrayed with the finesse of a lace maker.

Anyone reading the plot of After Tomorrow would rightly avoid this film as a weeper of the first order. That Borzage turned it into a riveting horror film is evidence of his great skill. Every performance is wonderful, natural. We all know at least some of these characters because they are so real and universal. Josephine Hull is amazing. Gombell and Collier steal the film with some of the most realistic performances I've ever seen. And even Charles Farrell is well suited for his roll. (I had watched Liliom the day before and couldn't imagine anyone less suited for a roll.) Because the plot is ordinary, Howe's photography is less apparent than usual but still shines.

Because the story is so ordinary and the characters so real, their problems affect us strongly. That they seem insurmountable affects us deeply. This is what true horror is about, worrying that nice people will come to a bad end. It's a film that must be seen once but probably shunned thereafter because it is so strong - sort of like Re- Animator (1985).