That Certain Woman

Yes, it's a ridiculous, confusing plot. Yes, the characterizations are clichéd archetypes. The portrayal of her son shows a child yanked around with what we would see today as neglect, or even cruelty. But David fully commits, and elevates the entire enterprise. She is showcased, and provides a subtlety and range of emotion far beyond the script, e.g., she makes her interaction with the child actor believable. Fonda hangs in there, but his character doesn't give him much to work with. And some scenes rise to her level -- especially the conversation with Anita Louise in her wheelchair. We see the characters reacting to one another in an unlikely and awkward plot contrivance, and simultaneously see two skilled actresses working together to make all this believable and even moving. Plus, the wheelchair action is ... remarkable. Davis looks great, beautifully photographed, well-lit, with the famous eyes showcased repeatedly, to great effect. The finale has to be seen to be believed. What the involved viewer expected - and dreaded - is suddenly revealed to have taken place, and the effect is -- hilarious relief. Certainly not a great film, but essential for those who appreciate and admire Davis.

Was actually expecting quite a lot from 'That Certain Woman'. Yes it did sound very melodramatic, but there was a good deal of talent involved. Bette Davis gave many great performances, the best of which legendary status, as did Donald Crisp, who did a lot of big supporting roles in a varying filmography (but nearly always one of the better things about the not so good films). Henry Fonda was no stranger to good performances either and Edmund Goulding's other collaborations with Davis ranged from above average to great.

Not so sadly with 'That Certain Woman', which is perhaps their weakest collaboration. Through no fault of Davis, who is actually the best thing about it, there are other good things and it started off promisingly. All of that is unfortunately undermined by the film falling apart in the second half, where the amount of soap suds that lingers even after the film is over leaves a bitter aftertaste and the character writing certainly should have much more balanced and less simplistic.

Davis is as said the best thing about 'That Certain Woman' and is quite wonderful. A wide range of emotions very powerfully conveyed, even when the film falls apart. It is such a shock seeing Crisp play such an unpleasant character, he plays him very well and menacingly without overacting. The other female characters are sympathetically portrayed, especially Anita Louise.

'That Certain Woman' is lovingly made, with a real sense of mood in the photography and the production values overall have a lot of class. Max Steiner's score is sumptuous and swells and sweeps in distinctive fashion. Goulding directs tastefully in the first half, which is quite charming and affecting.

All that is undone in the second half, where the melodrama gets excessively heavy, the sentimentality makes for at two trips to the bathroom to try and wash out the soap suds welling up in the mouth and things do get silly to the point of ridiculousness. The amount of self-sacrifices Mary makes is so much that it becomes nauseating. The ending somehow rings false and is especially mawkish. The script gets increasingly stilted and soapy, and the momentum in the pace really goes.

Fonda looks uncomfortable in a role that really does not suit him, got the sense too that he himself knew that. Ian Hunter has too little to work with and doesn't have an awful lot of presence, at least he fares better than Fonda. Did have a problem with how the characters are written, especially the male ones, where too few of the characters have much dimension and are either written as too perfect or too cruel.

On the whole, watchable but with a lot that doesn't work. 5/10

Mary Donnell (Bette Davis) has a checkered past as a gangster's young widow. Now, she's lawyer Lloyd Rogers' secretary. She falls for wealthy playboy client Jack Merrick (Henry Fonda) and they get a quickie marriage. His father disapproves of her.

It's a melodrama with star Bette Davis and future star Henry Fonda. Bette is able to keep the story moving with her superior acting. Fonda is a little miscast although this is very early in his career. He hasn't settled into his everyman genuineness. He's still a good romantic lead. He isn't able to bring out the flaws in his character. In the end, this is mostly about Bette and she makes this work.

This is a superior and under-rated "woman's picture" that really has all the elements of the classic weeper: star-crossed lovers, twists of fate, and self-sacrifice. It also has a sterling performance from Bette Davis which gives a strong indication of why she would soon be a superstar and regarded as the screen's best actress: Her belief in a character could suffuse it with passion and poignancy and transcend the shallowness of the accompanying story. She's supported by an excellent cast - Henry Fonda (in a basically thankless role), the ever-reliable Donald Crisp (her showdown scene with him oddly foreshadows similar scenes with Gladys Cooper in NOW, VOYAGER), Mary Phillips (in a role that in a later version would obviously have gone to Thelma Ritter), who was, at the time, Mrs. Humphrey Bogart (in the same year's MARKED WOMAN Davis would appear with Mayo Methot, the next Mrs. B., and Ian Hunter. Edmund Goulding, who excelled at this kind of thing, wrote and directed it - he would later direct Davis in two other notable soapers, DARK VICTORY (one of her most celebrated performances, as Judith Traherne), and THE GREAT LIE (for which Mary Astor won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar). It's all served up in the best Warner Bros. tradition, but doesn't seem to be as well-remembered as other such films of the era, such as MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION, STELLA DALLAS, or MY FOOLISH HEART.

Audiences will groan at the character of Mary Donnell. Bette Davis is normally looking out for number one--and she's definitely her good old self in the first half of the movie. The widow of a gangster, Donnell has become a super-competent legal secretary for a respected attorney in a big firm. She fends off unwanted press attention and generally handles herself quite well as a tough single girl in the big city.

She becomes the mistress of her married boss at the law firm (although the Hays Office undoubtedly required the removal of any breath of sexual content here, it should be pretty obvious to all what is going on). In the second half of the movie, which focusses on Jack Merrick (Henry Fonda), whom Donnell has always loved, she achieves peaks of self-sacrifice that will send you staggering to the bathroom to throw up.

This is the sort of film that gives soap opera a bad name.