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Poor factory girl (Joan Crawford) goes to New York to find fame and fortune. She quickly becomes a "kept" woman for a rich lawyer (Clark Gable--without his moustache). But she can't keep her past away forever and things start to go terribly wrong.

Strong (for 1931), short (71 minutes) pre-Code drama. The script is sharp and believable, the direction good and there are some incredibly lavish settings. Also Crawford and Gable are just great in their roles and both of them look incredibly beautiful. There was a brief part at the end that I didn't buy, but that didn't destroy the picture at all. Well worth seeing for anybody, but a definite must for Crawford and Gable fans.

Excellent soaper with a Joan Crawford billed above the soon-to-be superstar Clark Gable. The possibility of upward mobility afforded to women, especially at this time during the Great Depression, remains a theme of interest today. Women can play on men and get upward mobility but there is often a price to be paid -- and Joan pays it in this movie.

Excellent photography makes the best of the stars and Adrian's dressing of Joan. Notable train sequence in beginning of film has the poor Joan facing the possibility of the good life if she is willing to defy convention and joint those "inside the car." Gable teaches her how to act and she becomes a refined, but kept, woman. He refuses to marry her for all the "right" reasons but in the end, Joan is affected by society's opinion of women in her station.

Grandstand speech sequence at the end of the film is a bit too unbelievable but my wife was moved to tears when she saw it. One of Joan's better films. Recommended.

This movie goes to prove that pre-code Hollywood was much more mature and knew how to make movies of good taste on socially relevant issues. The theme of the woman who lives as a 'mistress' of the man she loves because he prefers not to get married was very daring in those days. The social background was also cleverly handled. One scene is particularly impressive and intelligent: when J. Crawford, just about to cross a railroad, stops to wait a train go slowly by and, through each window that passes, she has a glimpse of how the other half lives, just as though she were watching a movie. A visually very inspired moment.

I'm giving this one a 7/10 just based on the chemistry of Clark Gable and Joan Crawford alone! If it had been some other couple playing the leads this would only have warranted about a 5/10.

It's another take on one of Joan's shop girl roles that MGM so often cast her in, except here she (Marian) works in a box factory. The rather boorish Al Manning (Wallace Ford) thinks Marian is his for the asking, but Marian has bigger ideas. She has a conversation with a very drunk and wealthy Wally (Skeets Gallagher) who is enjoying the night air on the caboose of a train in the train yard, and he gives her his card and tells her to come see him.

Now Marian goes home to mom and an angry Al - he smells the liquor on her breath - and they have it out. She says she is leaving town and going to meet up with Wally in New York. She says that if she was a man they'd think it was right for her to use her brains to get what she can however she can. Now that last statement is an odd one because Marian behaves quite naively for the next 15 minutes of the film, not brainy at all. She DOES go to New York and she DOES look up Wally...who has little or no memory of her and is displeased to see her. But she catches him in one of his rare sober moments and he tells her upfront the invitation was never sincere, neither is he, and NO he will not introduce her to any of his rich friends. Marian is dejected and ejected. Her lucky break? Two of Wally's rich friends are on the way into his apartment as she leaves and she simply follows them back in. She just plainly asks them if they are rich and single because she has no time to waste on them if they are not!

Now this is all very stupid obvious behavior from Marian, who could easily have become a sadder but wiser girl if any of these men had the drive or ambition to make her one, but she lucks out. Gable's character (Mark Whitney) takes an instant liking to her honesty - you'll find out later why exactly, and the two are an instant couple, but not a married couple, for the next three years, traveling the globe together. Whitney even gives her a fake name and identity - Mrs. Moreland, a divorcée - so they can explain her expensive lifestyle as emanating from alimony. Mark shows her how to speak, how to dress, how to command a household of servants, how to host a dinner party - a complete makeover from the country mouse she was.

Then complications arise. Marian wants marriage that Mark won't give her, and New York's political machine wants Mark to become governor- and that means no mistress. How will this all work out? Watch and find out.

Like I said, nothing unusual here for early 30's MGM - the shop girl and the wealthy guy and the entailing Cinderella transformation, the small minded small town boyfriend, the mom who waits back home with a light in the window, the respectability that a mistress never has, etc. But every time Gable and Crawford are together you can feel the electricity - which was real by the way. The two had an affair for years but never got married because they figured they'd fight as man and wife.

And then there are a couple of coincidences. Here Joan takes on the identity of a divorcée and is taught the etiquette her station as Mark's companion will require. In 1950 she is also given a new name "Lorna Hanson Forbes" and the identity of a divorcée so she can be a married gangster's social companion and mistress with no questions asked. Then there is a film starring Joan with an identical name - "Possessed" - made in 1947. It has a completely different storyline though and is made by a different studio - Warner Brothers.

I'd say watch it, try not to get put out by the forgettable plot with a rather unsatisfactory ending and just note the great chemistry between Gable and Crawford, and really good acting in the supporting roles especially by Skeets Gallagher and Wallace Ford. Recommended.

I came by this movie when someone I know at work gave me a still-sealed copy from the Warner Archive Collection; they'd sent him two of the same title by mistake. Since it was Clark Gable and Joan Crawford I decided I'd give it a chance. Joan plays a factory worker who gets tired of the hum-drum life she leads and isn't interested in the man who's longed to marry her since they were kids (Wallace Ford) so she leaves it all and travels to New York City where she plays mistress to a wealthy lawyer (Gable) to get the kind of high living she wants. Three years later, Ford still wants to marry her, and Gable intends to run for Governor but his chances may be jeopardized by living with a woman. This pre-code film was nothing earth shattering, but had good performances from Crawford and Gable, and for me an added surprise bonus with a strong turn by Wallace Ford. I think through this movie it's easy to see Crawford's talents and how Gable was destined to become a big star. Director Clarence Brown has a nice touch, and some shots are very impressive. The one which stood out most for me is early on where Joan longingly observes well-to-do people interacting on a slow-moving train, as we see them through the windows of each passing car. When I see artistic flourishes like this in so many early '30s pictures (and many silents), my old defense of Tod Browning's Dracula for being dull due to it being an early talkie certainly falls flat. **1/2 out of ****

If you want a film to epitomise The Great Depression then this is for you. Although Warner Brothers are associated with pictures showing the plight of 'the little people' this superbly made, well acted MGM film focuses on just one young woman's struggle which because her character is so richly written and believable, it gives an authentic insight into the reality of the early thirties. Unlike a lot of films from 1931, this one takes you to what seems like a real place.

Joan Crawford may not be the world's most likeable actress but you'll not be able to tear your eyes from her in this. Her character is beautifully written with a naturalness that's fairly uncommon in 1931. She is unusually honest with an authenticity you'd associate with films made decades later but she is still most definitely a person who could only exist in the early thirties.

What also makes this so much better than some of its contemporaries is the high class direction. Although not one of Hollywood's best known directors these days, Clarence Brown was an astonishing filmmaker. A few months earlier he had made another of 1931's best films: A FREE SOUL. There's no stagey acting with a static cast awkwardly reading their lines in order. Brown makes everything flow just right. Watching this, something made so well, you'll wonder so many early talkies were so utterly terrible.

The story centres on Crawford's character Marian who decides to quit the humdrum of factory life in a nameless nowhere for the big city. She's not the usual sweet and innocent pure young thing about to get corrupted by a callous cynical millionaire: she knows exactly what she needs to do and she wants to do that. The only way for a girl like her to survive in the big city, she is told, is to hook a man, a rich man. This is exactly what she sets out to do and although it's not smooth sailing, she finds a good sugar daddy (and a young one) in the form of Clarke Gable, who himself is on top form. His character is not the lazy stereotype rich man so often seen in early talkies. He and also loveable anti-hero Wallace Ford are both as complex and layered as anyone in a modern film.

Overall, the naturalistic acting, imaginative direction and properly written characters make this picture entertaining, insightful and fun.

I am not a Joan Crawford fan, but I have come to appreciate her acting, especially in her early career. This film, released in 1931, shows her promise as an actress (not to mention Gable, who always displayed a magnetism that lit up the screen). Joan would star in another film titled "Possessed" in 1947, but they are two different stories. In this pre-Code story, adapted from a play, she is Marian Martin, a small-town girl who works in a box factory, but is determined to get ahead, though she sees no prospects locally.

A train passing through town slows and stops in front of her. Through the windows, she sees highlights of the high life, the life of the big city, promising wealth and romance. It is a wonderful scene. As a result, she makes her way to New York City, where she meets Mark Whitney (Clark Gable), a wealthy, unmarried attorney who immediately likes her no-nonsense honesty. They become involved, but he has no plans to marry her.

Crawford is vivacious and convincing in the role, showing a wide range of emotions. The film spotlights her beauty and her talent. In one scene, she sings in French, German and English. The song is "How Long Will it Last?"--an appropriate choice. The script is intelligent and the directing is clever and inventive.

There is only one section of the film that did not ring true, but it sets up a scene that is the dramatic climax of the film. As a whole, this film is well worth seeing.

Joan Crawford made two films, both with the title; "Possessed." This is the 1931 version (the other was made in 1947) and the two stories are nothing alike. Clark Gable is in this one, and it's a delight to see the two superstars together. (Supposedly, they were having a torrid affair at the time this was filmed).

Possessed (1931)

A wonderful Joan Crawford film not to be confused with her second, completely unrelated, also wonderful movie of the same title (yes) from 1947. This one, to be sure, also stars Clark Gable, and it dates from the years when Gable and Crawford had an intermittent, steamy affair. The chemistry is good, the filming excellent (and sometimes breathtaking), and the overall story a lively pre-code, Depression-era tale of succeeding.

But success at what cost? That's the key. You love Crawford's rise, and her methods are sincere even if not as sweet and homespun as the first scene would imply. It's not that she's corrupted, but that she discovers the excitement of the big city, and the truth that there really is sincerity there as much as in the little town she came from.

Gable represents every girl's dream, of course. He's suave, warm, funny. And rich. Their interactions are natural throughout, and the pace lively (as most of the famous pre-Code films are).

The filming is excellent, including a somewhat famous long take of Crawford, near the beginning, watching a train slowly amble by as a parade of different scenes unfolds through each window. It's worth seeing just for that scene alone (if you like great cinematography, and the aura of old Hollywood).

Clarence Brown is the uncredited (!) director here, and he's terrific. See "A Free Soul" made at the same time for another (even better) film showing off his ability to make dialogs crisp and true. (He's more famous for his many movies with Garbo, but he did a slew with Crawford.)

If you think there is a predictability here, you're going to be partly wrong. See this one, not because it's a classic, but because it's very very good, and forgotten. You will have trouble finding a good version, however. The one I found was on iTunes and it was so terrible (harsh tones, highlights so washed out you couldn't see their faces in many scenes) I don't recommend it. (I wrote to complain and got a quick refund, an apology, and a promise to look into it. I don't know if that fixed the problem, however, in Spring 2014.) Anyway, find a good copy somehow. Do it.

Classic case of the wrong director. This kind of Depression era, small town babe on the make in the Big City type stuff needs a light, breezy, sassy Roy Del Ruth or Mervin Le Roy. Instead, the job's been outsourced to heavy Clarence Brown and after a good beginning, with Skeets Gallagher excellent as the jaded roue Mad Hatter who lures Joan Crawford's poor Pennsylvanian down the rich rabbit hole, things get melodramatic and dull with a general lack of humor or pzazz in usually good Lenore Coffey's script. Plus this film is asking the viewer to buy that there actually exists a world where a girl would throw over Clark Gable for Wallace Ford! Incredible. Give it a C.

In 1931, rising star Clark Gable & already established star Joan Crawford made three films together at MGM. This is probably the best of those three, and maybe the best of all eight they did over a nine-year period (STRANGE CARGO in 1940 follows second best). Crawford is a poor Pennsylvania factory worker, who decides to go to New York to find fortune and happiness, eventually with married lawyer Gable. The plot relies on the familiar "Crawford formula" of a rags-to-riches story. 3 out of 4 stars.

The ambitious box factory worker Marian (Joan Crawford) lives in the countryside and dreams on having a luxury lifestyle, with a comfortable apartment, jewels and money. When her friend and also worker Al Manning (Wallace Ford) proposes to marry her, she goes to the train station and meets the millionaire Wally (Skeets Gallagher) that invites Marian to go to New York. On the arrival, she meets the prominent lawyer and aspirant to politician Mark Whitney (Clark Gable) and becomes his mistress. Three years later, Marian has become a refined woman and her dream has come true, but she falls in love with Whitney. When Manning visits her, he has become a self-made man and he believes that Marion has married a wealthy man. Soon Marian realizes that she is only the perfect mistress but not Whitney's wife. When he runs to governor, Marion sacrifices her relationship with Whitney to avoid a scandal that could damage his image in the elections.

"Possessed" is a dated movie with a corny conclusion, but still delightful to see despite the amoral story. Joan Crawford and Clark Gable have a perfect chemistry and there are witty dialogs. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Possuída" ("Possessed")

I hesitate to criticize this movie because it was made in 1931, and, really, what more do you want? Clark Gable and Joan Crawford for crying out loud!

But it's way too short for what it's trying to do. Much of the interesting action is missing. Also, after the first 20 minutes or so it gets very stagey and static - with one exception where Crawford skulks around in the study. She's great and has a real flair for being hurtful when it suits her. Unfortunately, Gable is not a terrific actor to begin with, and when his character has no affectations he can fall back on, like in Mogambo or It Happened One Night, he's quite stiff.

Overall, I'd recommend this movie just as I'd recommend almost all movies made before 1939 that have made it this far.

Small town factory worker Joan Crawford wants out of her cramped life and doesn't want to marry Wallace Ford. Can't say that I blame her on either count. So Joan heads off to the big city and eventually catches the eye of up-and-coming politician Clark Gable. The two enter into an "arrangement" but over time that becomes problematic for Gable's political career. Enter Crawford's ex Ford to stir things up.

Despite all the talk about feminist themes, this seemed like a pretty ordinary pre-Code programmer to me. At the end of the day, it's still another story about how a woman needs a man and marriage to be fulfilled and happy. That's not feminism last time I checked. The chemistry between the leads is nice but the trappings are dry and creaky at times. Joan gets to sing and is good. Why some seem to dislike the sappy ending I'm not sure. Some people just prefer downbeat endings I guess. Personally, I think the ending saves the movie. This is a decent film of its type and time. Not one of the best but OK. Gable and Crawford fans will like it more than most.

I love this film and watch it a lot. The ending is a bit sappy, and generally I turn it off after Joan tells Clark that she's not really in love with him. It's funny how many writers say they like it because of the "feminist" issues. Isn't it enough that the acting is good, the comedy is sophisticated and Joan sings a wonderful song in German, French and English? (The writer who said Bing Crosby did it better is just silly; how can one compare the two singers?) Are movies more valuable because they're about "important" themes? Is all the literature we've treasured over the centuries great because of anything other than it reflects the realities of love and life and death?

Nobody wrote better screen soap operas than Lenore Coffee, and she introduces some surprisingly modern notions of being-a-kept-woman in this pre-Code star vehicle for Joan Crawford, in her ambitious-gal-from-the-wrong-side-of-the-tracks phase. To escape the numbing mediocrity of her small-town box factory and unappealing suitor (Wallace Ford), she decamps to the Big Apple and soon meets up-and-coming lawyer-politician Clark Gable. Gable was 30 and unpolished, and isn't quite convincing as a man about town still smarting from a disastrous first marriage; ten years later he'd have been ideal. The camera loves Crawford, and Coffee is refreshingly nonjudgmental about the affair the pair pursues, though a couple of odd quirks pop up in its telling. To steer gossips away, the pair pretends she's a widow, which seems not only unnecessary but pointless; how is this going to throw anyone off their scent? And though she's clearly a kept woman, when old boyfriend Ford visits her and learns The Truth, she assures him there's nothing dirty going on; either she's lying or this is a very peculiar mistress relationship. It's swift and breezy with terse dialog, and though the 11th-hour plot turnabout is as unconvincing as every commenter says it is, one is entertained up to the end.

POSSESSED (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1931), directed by Clarence Brown, from the play "The Mirage" by Edgar Selwyn, reunites Joan Crawford and Clark Gable (still sans mustache) for the third of eight times on screen, following their initial 1931 collaborations of DANCE, FOOLS, DANCE and LAUGHING SINNERS. As much as POSSESSED might have been an appropriate title for a horror film involving demons, Crawford doesn't play a girl in need of an exorcism nor is she someone with mental problems involving the supernatural. It even bears no resemblance to the 1947 melodrama POSSESSED (Warner Brothers) which also starred Joan Crawford. For this production, Crawford typically plays a small town girl with big ambitions, with her possessed term belonging to one man or wanting to dominate someone to get ahead. Unlike their previous two efforts, this time Gable's name comes second under Crawford's in the opening credits, thus being a giant step for Gable's star status popularity to come.

Plot Summary: Marion Martin (Joan Crawford), an uneducated girl having dropped out of school at the age of 12, has a medial job at the Acme Paper Box Company. Although still living at home with her mother (Clara Blandick), Marion is loved by Al Manning (Wallace Ford), also a worker at the same company. Al wants nothing more than to marry Marion, but for now isn't interested in becoming anybody's wife, let alone living in the town with little chance of advancement. Bored with her life's existence, she comes across a passing train stopped at the station where she meets Wally Stuart (Richard "Skeets" Gallagher), a rich drunk from New York, who puts career ambitions into her mind through their conversation over champagne drinks, ending with him giving Marion his calling card. Arriving home hours later in a drunken state creates misunderstanding and verbal argument between Marion and Al, leading her to simply leave home and try out of luck in New York City. While there, Marion locates Wally's luxurious apartment at 890 Park Avenue where the now sober Wally, slowing recollecting their meeting at the train depot, to offer her further advice of getting ahead by striking out on her own and getting a rich man. She does so with one of Wally's friends, Mark Whitney (Clark Gable), a rich lawyer with political ambitions. Mark immediately takes an interest in Marion, especially through her honesty in using him to get ahead. Three years pass. Marion, now a wealthy socialite, speaking fluent German and French languages, passes herself off as the wealthy divorcee, "Mrs. Moreland," though her society friends know about her live-in relationship with Mark, who refuses to marry for reasons of his own. When considering on running for governor, Mark is advised by his political party to break away from "Mrs. Moreland" to avoid scandal and ruin in his career, a scheme plotted by John Driscoll (John Miljan), his political enemy, to run a dirty campaign against Mark. Also in the cast is Frank Conroy (Horace Travers); Marjorie White (Vernice LaVerne); and Jack Pennick (The Heckler), among others.

No doubt that POSSESSED proved favorable upon theatrical release, especially with Crawford and Gable proving themselves as a remarkable screen team with each passing film. A pre-code production no doubt due to circumstances involving the romantic couple, Crawford typically rises from nothing to a woman of culture, even to a point of singing French, German and English versions to the theme song titled "How Long Will It Last?" to her society friends. Virtually forgotten today, that tune would be commonly used for opening credit underscoring for other MGM productions of the day. Wallace Ford, years before playing either newspaper reporters or later middle-age drunken characters in the 1960s, is seen here as a slim and trim young cement worker rising to top contractor out for Mark's assistance for a road construction project, unaware that the girl he loves happens to be Mark's mistress. The actors play their parts well, with tight editing of 76 minutes to hold interest throughout. Regardless of the scene following the auditorium campaign which doesn't ring true, at least much of this polish MGM "soap opera" style production is entirely satisfying.

Distributed on video cassette with plastic clam shell in 1985, and decades later on DVD, both 1931 and 1947 Joan Crawford editions of POSSESSED can be found, enjoyed and compared whenever presented on Turner Classic Movies cable network. (***)

Joan Crawford's first of two different films to be titled "Possessed", this one a creaky, campy Depression-era drama co-starring an oddly bland Clark Gable. Estimable screenwriter Lenore Coffee adapted Edgar Selwyn's play "The Mirage", and was probably a very good choice for the project since she comes at the material from the female point-of-view. Crawford plays a factory-girl from the sticks who relocates to New York and falls in love with a wealthy attorney. Film was considered risqué for its time, but today only the evocative photography is arresting (especially an early sequence showing lives on a train through the windows, a shot which is never topped for the rest of the picture). Overall, a trite soaper, but definitely worth-catching for the curiosity value alone. ** from ****