Le lys du ruisseau

I thoroughly enjoyed the acting in this film: Ginger Rogers as the daughter of prostitute Marjorie Rambeau (an Oscar nomination), who supports the family; Joel McCrea as the man Rogers sort of ropes into marrying; Miles Mander as her educated alcoholic father, who can translate Greek but is otherwise useless and knows it; Queenie Vassar as her grandmother, an ex-prostitute who would rather see Rogers become a prostitute than settle down with McCrea; and the remarkable young child actress, Joan Carroll as Rogers' young sassy kid sister. Her rendition of the poem "Don't Swat Your Mother, Boys" was a hoot. When McCrea meets Rogers as she digs for clams, and steals a kiss (her first one) as he starts to gives her a lift home, she falls in love. That night she goes to see McCrea at the Bluebell Club and lies when she says she's run away and can't return, never mentioning her family for fear of alienating him. They marry, but of course the truth comes out eventually, creating a rift. The acting is so natural I felt as though I was looking into a window observing the lives of these people.

The word "prostitute" is never mentioned (it would have given the 1940 censors apoplexy), but it was obvious anyway. Still, the film was banned in Detroit, and the play was modified to placate those censors. Queenie Vassar was primarily a stage actress; this was her first film.

Joel McCrea & Ginger Rogers star in this tale of a romance from across the tracks. Rogers lives in a ramshackle home populated by a ramshackle family who's matriarch is a lady of the night & the patriarch is a souse. When she meets McCrea, who is a go-getter working at a gas station slash hash-house, she thinks her financial woes are over & soon marries him but when the truth of Rogers' family come to bear, McCrea feels trapped & betrayed & acts accordingly (at least he thinks so). Mixing humor, pathos & romance in what could've been an unsavory package, this film finds the right note for the telling.

his is a heartbreaking movie. It's a romantic comedy -- but only incidentally. Ginger Rogers and Joel McCrea, though good as always, are essentially plot devices.

My only quibble is that, particularly noticeable in their courting scenes, the lower class American grammar is forced and unconvincing.

Gregory La Cava got brilliant performances from Marjorie Rambeau and Miles Mander as a party girl her broken-down alcoholic husband, a scholar of the classics (who are the Rogers character's parents.)

Queenie Vassar is excellent as Rambeau's still gold-digging mother, and Vivienne Osborne is splendid as her friend Thelma.

This will make you smile -- Rogers and McCrea spring to life in the last couple scenes. But it will make you cry and move you much more. At least it did so to me.

Joel McCrea and Ginger Rogers did some of their best work in this picture. The story is a great one, and it was well executed. It should have made the list of 100 greatest American films, but there are flaws. Two of the secondary character are caricatures - the grandmother and the little sister were overplayed. The father, while perhaps realistic, came off as a melodramatic, sick joke. The coverage of one of the main themes, prostitution, was handled too graphically for 1940's audiences and too "victorianly" for modern audiences. But these are really minor complaints. I think Ginger Rogers did a great job, and should have gotten an academy award. When I first watched it, before I found out when the movie was made, I thought it must have been very early, say 1933, because she was very convincing as an apparent teenager - say a 19 year old. I should have realized the movie was not that old, as the direction, cinematography, and other secondary production aspects were much better, definitely in the "Citizen Kane" ranks. And after all, Ginger was very good at playing women a lot younger than she (see "The Major and the Minor"). Joel McCrea was also excellent, showing again that if he would have resisted his urges to play cowboys he could have developed a reputation as one of the greatest American film stars (see "Foreign Correspondent"). I am happy to see that IMDb users rate this film above 6.0, but I think it is much better than that.

this version(the only one I have seen) takes place in the fishing industry of Monterey California. It not only takes place in the famous stomping grounds of John Steinbeck but is as interesting as many of his stories such as Cannery Row and Tortilla Flat. Like a good Steinbeck story it about the poor and the very poor. The lower working class that struggles to survive and the even less fortunate. Ginger Rogers' family is made up of the even less fortunate.A kind mother who sells herself to keep a roof over their head and at the same time takes care of an alcoholic husband. Well acted by real troopers of the early thirties and well worth watching. Snappy dialogue and some wonderful shots of Montereys' scenic coast are an added plus. The Blue Bell Cafe is mentioned often in this film and was an actual popular establishment in the town of Monterey.