La danseuse de corde

There are only so many stories, especially stories of love.

This is rather ordinary. It consists of three threads.

The first is of a relatively plain girl who loves a star, but he loves another, a vamp who doesn't care for him but manipulates him. But our gal sticks with it, even though the guy is an unfaithful, lying drunk. Eventually she does something heroic and saves his reputation. Impressed, he falls in love with her. Ho hum. That someone once related to this is mildly interesting.

And then there's the spectacle of the circus. In 1929, this would have still thrilled, what with the risks and spectacular falls.

But the reason to watch this today is because the "plain" girl is played by Clara Bow! Only a couple years before, this was the sexiest woman in the world, our first redheaded film sex symbol. She, the IT girl. Here, she is absolutely the least attractive girl in a skimpy costume. Here, she lacks all the poised seduction she had mastered before. Its because she speaks, I think.

The stories are well known, how she froze with insecurity. How audiences abandoned her instantly when hearing her low class, Yiddish-tinged Brooklyn squeak. This, the sexiest woman in the entire world of media.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

In the late silent era, Clara Bow was the biggest starlet in Hollywood...with one hit after another. However, in the sound era her career languished and I've read books that said it was because of her thick New York accent...it just wasn't right for the talkies. Well, I think this is pure crap. She sounded just fine and could act...but the studios (particularly Paramount) kept giving her inferior material...like movies like "Dangerous Curves"...a poorly written film with an unlikable leading man.

Pat (Bow) is a very sweet girl in the circus. She's kind and decent...and for some reason she's interested in Larry (Richard Arlen)...a complete jerk in every possible way. Larry is completely indifferent about decent Pat and instead chases after the selfish Zara (Kay Francis)...even though she treats him like dirt. Eventually, she leaves him and the circus for another man. Larry begins drinking heavily and Pat rescues him and brings him back his self-respect. But as soon as he's sober and has created a new act with Pat, he dumps her and brings back Zara!! What an idiot...and that is THE main trouble with the character. Additionally, Arlen himself is pretty bland and both Francis and Bow act circles around him...so to speak.

The story just makes no sense. Larry is a louse and his interest in Zara and disinterest in Pat is confusing to say the least. Additionally, you wonder WHY...why would Pat like such a jerk. In fact, you wonder why she wouldn't just spit on him or worse! Yet, the plot is a longsuffering woman plot...and it's bound to turn off most viewers...along with Arlen's blandness.

With a few more films like this as well as her own declining mental health, it's very understandable how Bow was pretty much finished in Hollywood by the time she was only 28! My, how fickle Hollywood was when it came to her...much like Larry in this film!

Clara Bow is excellent in this picture- she really could act...very animated, very ebullient performance. Remember that this was something like only the second 'talkie' that she had ever done, but she knew how to modulate her voice (she did have a Brooklyn accent, but that was kind of interesting). Hands down the best actor in the movie.

Another impressive aspect of this film was the quality of the sound- for 1929 it was impressive with articulate dialogue, clear audio.

This, I believe, is Kay Francis's first film. Francis is beautiful with a sultry voice; not too difficult to see how her career took off like a rocket.

Clara Bow (Pat Delaney) loves star tightrope walker Richard Arlen (Larry Lee), but he loves his partner Kay Francis (Zara Flynn), who is two timing him with the third partner David Newell (Tony Barretti).

Acting and some of the dialog is OK, but there is not much to recommend the picture for. Other than the tightrope walking, there are few circus acts to be seen.

Why are some reviewers saying Clara Bow's acting in this is amazing and fantastic? It's not - she's OK at best. Just before this, she was in Dorothy Arzner's superb WILD PARTY. In that she was amazing but Mr Mendes didn't have Miss Arzner's directing talent.

When people say how great she is in this, it belittles how surprisingly great and natural she was in her first talkie. Maybe great is an exaggeration because WILD PARTY was such a well made picture, her short comings were somewhat shielded. What grouping all Clara Bow films together does is belittle how competent an actress she eventually became by the time she stared in her best work: CALL HER SAVAGE. Now that was good! Yes, in a couple of years she'd be a decent actress - in 1929 she wasn't.

This film is a massive disappointment after her first talkie - Paramount's first talkie - that was clever, mature and beautifully written. This is a trashy story rushed out simply as a mindless excuse to put Clara Bow on the screen to bring in, as they used to say, 'serious coin.' It's not however as unimaginably awful as her next film: SATURDAY NIGHT KID. Why was her agent trying to destroy her career?

Miss Bow is certainly not the worst actor in this. Neither is it Richard Arlen who is pitiful but those two are like Olivier and Leigh compared with that unfeasibly untalented acting phenomenon known as Kay Francis! Special shriek with horror award goes to her hair....of lack of. Oh my God, was that look considered sexy back then? She looks like a little boy with a big fat face! And that "acting!" If ever there was a case against the old practice of young actresses getting parts based on their performance on the casting couch, Kay Francis was it! She's absolutely terrible - but she must have been amazing elsewhere!!