Dulcy

"Not So Dumb" is a movie you'll probably love or hate...and I could easily see someone hating it. After all, it's the story of a ditsy and obnoxious woman who talks nonstop....and a little of this does go a long way.

The story starts with Mr. Forbes and his family arriving in California for a big business deal with Gordy. Gordy's fiancee, Dulcy (Marion Davies) insists that she host Forbes and his family for the weekend. However, it's obvious Forbes isn't interested and only goes because his wife and daughter want to go.

From the minute the guests arrive, Dulcy talks nonstop and tries way too hard to make sure Forbes has a great time. But she also NEVER listens to him nor his body language and instead thrusts various things on him...insisting he'll have a great time...which he obviously is NOT having. So what's to come of this big business deal after Dulcy annoys Forbes half to death?

Marion Davies works very hard to be flighty and annoying....but the problem is that she really IS quite annoying. This made the film hard going for me....I found a little of Dulcy goes a long way...and making her less abrasive might have made for a better film. Apparently, I am not alone in this sentiment, as the film lost money and the public mostly avoided it.

By the way, if you do watch, you might be shocked when Dulcy tosses out the N-word in the middle of the movie. It seemed to come from the middle of no where and no doubt will offend some!

Not So Dumb (1930)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

The third film between director King Vidor and star Marion Davies isn't in the same league as SHOW PEOPLE or THE PATSY and really comes off as a major disappointment. Based on the play Dulcy, Davis plays that character, a blond moron who tries to help her boyfriend get his foot in the door of a big business by inviting his boss and his wife over for the weekend. Once there, Dulcy plays host to try and make herself appear smarter than she actually is. I've said this about a lot of films from this era but here it goes again. This is an early talkie that is so impressed by the fact that words can be heard that it never knows when to shut up. You can tell Davies and Vidor aren't too comfortable with the new format because it's hard to look at this film and see any of the director's trademarks. The film looks rather ugly and some of the editing will leave you scratching your head and wondering if only one take was done on certain scenes and they had to cut away from it quickly. Davies, God bless her, gives it her all but it seems Vidor just let her go off in any direction and the end result is a bit of a mess. Her character is a complete idiot and Davies gets this across just fine but after a while she starts to get very annoying because she's reduced to silly facial gestures and various facial "shock" moves. Franklin Pangborn steals the show as Leach and George Davis is also good as the rather strange butler. Fans of Davies will probably watch this no matter what but the only others that might be mildly interested are those interested in early talkies. I'm sure they've had to sit through some pretty rough films so this here is yet another. I've yet to see the original 1923 version or the remake in 1940.

I have a feeling that Marion Davies fans have voted in droves to artificially elevate her scores because many of her films are rated in the high 7s or 8s. I have enjoyed many of these films but I hesitate to place them that highly. A case in point is "Ever Since Eve", her last movie, coming in with an 8 which in my opinion is highly overrated as is the score for this film, a 7.8 as of this writing. Be that as it may, "Not So Dumb" is actually superior to "Ever Since Eve". Davies is absolutely delightful playing a ditsy socialite trying to advance her boyfriend's career. Her body language makes the film which otherwise has little contact with reality. She lives in a mansion with no apparent income, neither she nor her brother work and yet they enjoy a quite opulent lifestyle. This very fact undermines the film's central premise because if she were wealthy why then does she not set her boyfriend up herself? The other characters are merely ornaments although two are somewhat noted minor Hollywood personalities: Julia Faye, C.B. DeMille's longtime companion who appeared in all his films and Sally Starr, known as the "pocket Clara Bow" for her diminutive size.

This early talkie is a bit creaky—sound recording technology certainly wasn't perfected yet, for one thing. It's also very evident that it's a movie version of a stage play—there's no doubt it's "stagey," which bothers some people. So it takes some doing, but Marion Davies' wacky performance eventually overcomes these distractions.

Davies is both nutty and charming as Dulcy, a wealthy young socialite who is determined to help her fiancé put over a big business deal.

Elliott Nugent is fine as the fiancé who would much prefer that Dulcy mind her own business; his performance, like his character, is pretty much overshadowed by the much bigger and bolder Davies personality. Old character actor William Holden is very good as the blustery and flustered business magnate with whom Davies is trying to match up Nugent.

Davies' extremely expressive face places her much more in a class with fellow comedians than with other female movie stars of the day; while her screen presence is nothing at all like, for example, Joan Crawford's—it's not entirely unlike Stan Laurel's or Harold Lloyd's.

Her appeal lies in a kind of well-meaning goofiness that other characters may find irritating but is both hilarious and endearing to us viewers. A great example: the drawing room scene in which a house guest sings a song while Davies aggressively shushes everyone and then noisily unwraps a box of candy.

The comic plot is okay and there is some funny dialog. But the main attraction of the picture is certainly the star—this is lots of fun for fans of Marion Davies and her other comedies.

Sound quality is TERRIBLE for most of the film, but i guess that can be forgiven since talkies hadn't been around very long. Marion Davies stars as Dulcy Parker, who is hosting a get-together for the big shot "Forbes" coming into town for the big business deal. Keep an eye out for the always-fun Franklin Pangborn as "Leach", who gives the weirdest hand-shake we have ever seen, and Dulcy tells us he has some secret... Raymond Hackett is Dulcy's sarcastic, wise-cracking brother. Hackett had about ten speaking roles, and seven of those were in 1930 alone! One of the funniest roles here is the facial expressions on Perkins the butler - George Davis doesn't have a lot of lines, but his appearance as the guests come and go add a lot to the performance. Elliott Nugent is "Gordy", Dulcy's boyfriend, trying to close the deal. Lots of yackety yack, since this is based on a play. This was a remake of the silent 1923 version, and it would be remade again in 1940 with Ann Sothern and Billie Burke. There are some bad editing cuts here and there, but the conversations are mostly clever and fun, with some sight gags and one-liners by various characters. I think some of the comedy bits, including Pangborn's big scene in the living room, were probably very funny back in the day, but just seem to go on and on by today's standard. Directed by the amazing King Vidor, who had done it all in the early days of Hollywood. Original play written by Kaufman, who had also written "Man Who Came to Dinner" and "You Can't Take it with You", also made into films.