Les Folles Héritières

Barbara Stanwyck, Geraldine Fitzgerald and Nancy Coleman are the Gaylord sisters. when the parental units croak, they must find a way to hang on to the family compound. Right at the beginning, we see that mom Gaylord has died on the Lusitania, and dad is going off to war, certainly an ominous start to the film. Then we're at the court house for some reason. The co-starring men are Gene Lockhart, George Brent, Gig Young, and Grant Mitchell. some pretty big hollywood names backing up this film. Grant Mitchell is the head of the group fighting to gain control of ten percent of the family fortune. Eighteen minutes in, we finally hear from Barbara Stanwyck, one of the heiress sisters. and the strongest one. she clearly runs the show. she has fired the family lawyer, and now they are scrambling to find a good lawyer to help them in court. Turns out that someone knows a secret about one of the sisters, and that secret could be worth a lot of money. It's pretty good! clearly, secrets and things that might be shocking in 1942 are really no big deal today. it was a different time, and of course the film code was in full force in the 1940s. Directed by Irving Rapper; had made SO MANY films with perfectionist Bette Davis... he must have been a pro!

Three girls, the youngest descendents of the Gaylord family, one of America's most royal families, are orphaned at a young age. Right before he goes off to France to fight in WWI, their father tells the oldest, Fiona, never to sell the land. By the time the sisters have become adults, they have had to squander most of their money to pay for lawyers to defend their property. Through certain loopholes in the father's will, a man named Charles Barclay stands to gain possession of the Gaylord land, on which he wants to build a complex called Barclay Circle. Barclay is actually based on John D. Rockefeller, who was buying up land and buildings from affluent families in New York so he could build Rockefeller Center.

This film deals mostly with the melodramatic concerns of the three sisters. Fiona, well played by Barbara Stanwyck, although it's certainly not to be counted as one of her best roles, seems like a cold, domineering woman, and it becomes clear that she has some skeletons in her closet. Susanna, played by Nancy Coleman, is a little ditsy and completely in love with a young modern artist named Gig Young. Coleman's was my favorite performance in the film. Evelyn, played by Geraldine Fitzgerald, is a rather pretentious seductress with a monocle who married into noble blood in England, but that doesn't stop her from trying to steal Gig from her sister. The three sisters are developed quite well but, as is the major trend in The Gay Sisters, never well enough. Charles Barclay is played by George Brent. He isn't very good. Well, he would be satisfactory if the story had played out the way it should have, but he always seems like a scumbag in the film. When we're asked to sympathize with him late in the film, it's impossible. Gig Young is played by, huh?, Gig Young. No, he's not playing himself. What happened is that the actor, who had acted in several movies previously under his real name, Byron Barr, was pressured by Warner Brothers to change his name to something more catchy. I'm not sure who made the final choice, but he eventually changed his screen name to Gig Young, after the character whom he plays in The Gay Sisters. Weird, eh? Young is quite good through most of the film, but the script does some unfortunate things with his character late in the film which ultimately harm the audience's sympathy for him. In two other supporting roles, Helen Thimig and Gene Lockhart are quite good.

The Gay Sisters had great potential to turn out to be one of the great cinematic family sagas. The characters are all interesting, as are their situations. Unfortunately, the script never strives for anything more than the simplest melodrama. If it had made the interrelationships of all the major characters more complex, fleshed out, for example, the rivalry between Evelyn and Susanna or made the flashback more intricate, the film could have been fantastic. It also could have fleshed out the prologue more, let us know more about the Gaylord family. We need to care more about the characters and we need to sympathize with them more. And the ending needed some major fixing. It basically just gives up at the end. Fiona's problems are solved so poorly that it hurts. Whatever sympathy her character had gained as the film progressed falls apart. It's also far too happy. This story seems moving towards tragedy, or maybe just a sense of historical significance or loss. And we still hate Barclay. And the conflict between the two sisters and Gig is never solved. As bad as Fiona's story ends, Susanna's, Gig's, and Evelyn's is even worse.

I still liked the film. It's thoroughly watchable, even if it doesn't involve us like other great films of the era. 7/10, mostly for its potential. It should have been remade, or the novel should have been re-adapted, at some point during the studio era. It is too dated to be remade now. The 1950s would have been the best time, during the time of films like Giant.

It's a little disconcerting to have a character named Gig Young in a movie...played by Gig Young. But this film is where Gig got his name and also a nice career boost after playing small parts under another name.

I'm going to go against the majority of the other comments and state that I really enjoyed this film, mainly because of the vibrant performance of Barbara Stanwyck as Fiona. She was funny, angry, vulnerable, caring, and feisty as the oldest of three daughters whose mother died on the Lusitania, and whose father was later killed during Woar War I.

As the "man" of the house, Fiona has stood steadfast for years against settling her father's will which would therefore allow a Donald Trump type named Charles Barclay to get the family home. But Fiona's keeping a secret as to why she hates Barclay so much. Geraldine Fitzgerald is the middle, flirty sister, who is married to an Englishman but craves her youngest sister's boyfriend (Gig Young).

If you're a Stanwyck fan, this is a no miss.

The longest running case In New York County's Surrogate Court is the one about recent tycoon George Brent has going against the Gaylord sisters who were all quite young when their mom was lost in the Titanic and their dad killed in World War I. Now another World War is happening and the grownup sisters Barbara Stanwyck, Geraldine Fitzgerald, and Nancy Coleman.

Stanwyck and Brent have some serious if secret history and a product of said history is young Larry Simms. The two can't stand each other though obviously at one time they could.

A subplot involves Nancy Coleman and Geraldine Fitzgerald fighting over Gig Young. He's a modern artist keeping company with Coleman. Fitzgerald went over to Great Britain and married a title. Her husband is MIA with the Royal Air Force and she's come back to America.

Gig Young who was born Byron Barr apparently liked the character name and took it for his own. He got his first real notice in The Gay Sisters. It certainly worked for him.

Originally this was assigned to Bette Davis, but she rejected it the brothers Warner went outside the studio for Barbara Stanwyck. It's a great part for Stanwyck as she shows a whole range of emotions here. Gene Lockhart has a great part as a weasel of an attorney ready to sell out the Gaylords. He was so good in those type parts.

The Gay Sisters is a fine bit of drama that holds up well after over 70 years.

The three Gaylord sisters (Barbara Stanwyck, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Nancy Coleman), lose their parents at an early age and fight to keep their family mansion. George Brent plays the guy after the mansion and when you find out why your eyes will roll so hard they'll fall out of your head. Stanwyck is feisty to the point of obnoxiousness and Brent is a prick. He's also a rapist, if I interpreted one crucial scene correctly. Very disappointing melodrama with a plot that's much ado about nothing. Inappropriate moments of humor don't help. Protracted opening with Donald Woods as the father who goes on and on about the family legacy and what it means to be a Gaylord has next to nothing to do with the rest of the movie. One little bit of interesting trivia: actor (and future murderer) Gig Young took his stage name from the character he plays in this movie. Before this he went by his real name of Byron Barr.