Always in My Heart

Despite the Warners fanfare and Warners leading lady Kay Francis, it has influences of other studios. There's the multi-ethnic-music-making a la MGM; the also Metro-like mixing of highbrow and lowbrow music; the attempt to launch Gloria Warren as the studio's answer to Universal's Deanna Durbin (she's not bad, but she's not Deanna); "funny" musicians led by Borah Minevitch, sort of like RKO's Kay Kyser, or Spike Jones; and a melodramatic premise that would embarrass anybody. The small-California-town ambiance, with everybody nice to everybody, and smiling mailmen and ice cream men and such, is so dated it seems to belong to another planet. The plot, with Kay Francis planning to marry rich but unlikable Sidney Blackmer, then finding out that her convict husband Walter Huston is still alive and paroled, is absolutely ridiculous. And yet, and yet. Huston, one of the three or four best actors American movies ever had, underplays everything so beautifully that you're hooked. Watch him watch his unsuspecting kids who don't know he's their dad, or singing the appealing title song in that high, heart-tugging voice of his to his daughter, I got teary. The director pitches the emotions too high and cuts too rapidly (at times it approaches MTV pacing), and the ethnic stereotypes are grating--lots of "ot'sa fine" Italians, and just guess which harmonica player in Minevitch's band swings it hot. Not a good movie, and yet, thanks to Huston, and, to a lesser extent, the ladylike Francis (who sure knew how to wear a hat), I couldn't stop watching.

Kay Francis is mother to two children--one who is a bit of an idiot and a daughter who is constantly singing. Francis has a fiancé who loves her but obviously wants to ship her nearly adult children off to college. You can't blame him too much, especially with all the singing, but you wonder about Kay's sanity as she seems to be the only one who doesn't recognize this.

Unknown to all but Kay is the fact that her dead husband isn't dead after all but is in prison. Since he was sentenced to prison for life, they both decided to tell the children he was dead and Kay was encouraged repeatedly by her husband (Walter Huston) to remarry. Huston is not your typical Hollywood prisoner, as he's a model of decency and eventually the state decides to pardon him just before Francis' wedding to her stuffy but rich boyfriend. However, Huston does NOT want to return to their lives, as he feels they have a right to continue as they are--he just doesn't want to upset their lives. But, he's also curious how his children have become so he secretly checks up on them with no intentions of letting them know who he really is. Of course, this plan has complications--otherwise, there wouldn't be much of a movie!

The plot of ALWAYS IN MY HEART isn't believable but despite this, the story is quite entertaining and watchable. However, Warner Brothers' latest singing discovery, Gloria Warren, made the movie tough going. That's because her style of singing was akin to Jeanette MacDonald combined with a banshee!! One reviewer called it "screeching" and this isn't far from the truth!! I can see why this young prodigy only made a few films, as every time she sang the hair on my neck stood up and my ears burned. So my advice is if the movie comes back on TV, copy it first. Then, when you watch it, you can speed through the god-awful songs!!

Several reviews have been posted for this film which deride the movie's music. Don't buy into them! Gloria Warren's voice (despite the fact that she only made 5 films), is every bit the equal of Kathryn Grayson, Deanna Durbin and Jeanette McDonald. Also, the performances of the harmonica "orchestra" are nothing short of amazing. Coupled with the performances of Walter Huston and Kay Francis, this is decidedly an endearing film.

This movie is enjoyable except for the singing. I don't understand what people were thinking in the forties. How anyone could find the high pitched screeching enjoyable is beyond me. TMC seems to play the screechers early in the morning. I think it may be a fiendish plot of some kind. A strange mix of humor, tragedy, opera and cornball situations. But like I said, it is enjoyable. Just block out the screeching. Keep your thumb at the ready by the mute button. By the way, there must be a hundred harmonica players in this film. The harmonicas/screeching is a bizarre mix. In the middle of it all, there is some decent acting. The little girl, I am not sure of the familial connection, is a real cutie.

Always In My Heart was taken from the play Fly Away Home which ran for 204 performances in 1935. In the original Broadway cast, Thomas Mitchell was the star in the role that Walter Huston played on screen. And a 15 year old Montgomery Clift made his stage debut in the role of the son.

During the interim before it reached the screen the film that became known as Always In My Heart was adapted for the wartime present. It also became a musical of sorts with one original song written for it, You're Always In My Heart and some classical and standard pop songs filling out the score. Because it was a musical the emphasis went away from the son and father to the daughter and father with Gloria Warren who Jack Warner was obviously building up to be his answer to Universal's Deanna Durbin. Warren sang pretty, but never quite made it as a second Durbin.

Walter Huston is the father of Frankie Thomas and Gloria Warren who was in jail for about 15 years and was pardoned. During that time he divorced their mother Kay Francis at his insistence. He figured he was going to be in jail for life as that was the sentence meted out to him for a homicide of a business partner who doubledealed him. The kids were told he died and Francis is now ready to marry the stuffy, but rich Sidney Blackmer.

Stopping by the house and not meeting Francis, Huston ingratiates himself with Warren when he tunes her piano and in that displays the musical knowledge and gift he's passed on to Warren. They develop a relationship of sorts as Huston decides to hang around see his kids for a few days before exiting their lives.

Thomas is getting his hormones in an uproar over the sexy Amida on this California coast town, but she's only using him to make her boy friend Anthony Caruso jealous. He's in need of some fatherly advice even if he doesn't know it's his father. As for Warren she likes singing with the poor fisher folk living on the wharves with their harmonica band led by Borrah Minevitch. Blackmer does not approve of her associating with the lower classes.

Towards the downside of her career, Kay Francis gradually transitioned into mother roles, if the film had been done at MGM, Greer Garson might have been cast. She and Huston do well together in their joint scenes.

The title song for Always In My Heart received an Academy Award nomination as the Best Song, the only nomination the film received. But this was the year of White Christmas and no other song was going to win the Oscar that year.

Certain things in the film tell me that the original play was a great deal more serious. The changes were made in keeping with wartime years as Gloria Warren the Harmonica Rascals led by Borrah Minevitch were aiming at both a USO show and a big radio contract. Of course Warren is also aiming to study seriously as well.

The changes leave Always In My Heart quite a hybrid film, not quite drama and not quite comedy. Still it's a pleasant enough film with the cast doing very well by their roles.