His Glorious Night

Even amongst the reviews featured on this platform, the widely believed stories about John Gilbert's speaking voice are repeated. There really is nothing wrong with his voice at all. Arguably it would suit him better if it was a little deeper, but this could be learned over a period of time with voice coaches. The reason this movie was such a disaster for him is the script. The lines he is given to speak are just so utterly utter. I love you. I love you. You're driving me insane your eyes sparkle like diamonds and blah blah blah. It's just annoying really. I make every allowance for the fact that this is a very early talking picture and some performers were still learning how to adjust away from their silent film techniques. I don't think any actor could rise above this dialogue and I certainly would expect something better from Lionel Barrymore as the director. John Gilbert could have recovered over a period of time except for the fact that it seems as though Lewis B Mayer may have had it in for him but that is another story.

HIS GLORIOUS NIGHT is deadly dull as directed by Lionel Barrymore. This film is based on a play by Molnar with all the liveliness of a dictionary. After a decent opening that introduces the main characters and has John Gilbert as the dashing Captain Kovacs winning a horse race (obviously speeded up), it settles into a static, music-less, slog of talk.

Remember what Norma Desmond said. "So they opened their big mouths and out came talk, talk, talk!" She obviously saw this film. Basic plot has Gilbert as the dashing captain who is romancing a princess (Catherine Dale Owen). But the mother does not approve and so has a crony spill the beans that Gilbert is the son of a shoemaker. "You peasant!" she cries.

To get even Gilbert spreads a false rumor that he's actually a fraud and that he's really a notorious swindler posing as a Captain (apparently worse than being a peasant). Once the princess and mother (Nance O'Neil) get wind of this they are terrified of an embarrassing scandal. The mother tries to marry off the daughter to the limp Tyrrell Davis and it almost works. But Gilbert has the fun of calling their bluff and admitting that he's really just a peasant (not a swindler). Faced with Davis over Gilbert, Owen comes to her meager senses and humiliates herself by chasing after Gilbert.

This is shot with almost no camera movement. The actors sit around talking. On the sidelines are a humorous older count and his wife (Richard Carle, Eva Dennison) and the ambitious Americans (Hedda Hopper and her daughter Doris Hill). Gustav von Seyffertitiz plays the gossiping crony.

Gilbert's voice is fine, maybe a little sing-songy. It's the material that lacks. The film was a modest hit. There is an "I LOVE YOU bit a la Singin' in the Rain but it's said off camera while the lovers are in the bushes.

John Gilbert gets a pass; Lionel Barrymore gets a fail.

Princess Catherine Dale Owen breaks off her affair with dashing officer John Gilbert to facilitate her marriage to Prince Tyrell Davis, using the excuse he is actually a commoner. Then it turns out he is not just a commoner, but a convicted swindler.

Based on a Molnar play that played 37 shows on Broadway, this movie suffers from a lot of common problems of movies from 1929, particularly from MGM. It is visually inert, people talk very loudly so they can be heard on the primitive sound equipment. Add to that the fact it isn't a very good play, and you are already operating under a handicap, it's hard to think of anything good to say about it.

But wait! There's more! This is the legendary stinker that demonstrated that either John Gilbert had a high, squeaky voice or Louis Mayer had the sound department wreck the recording because he hated Gilbert. It was so ludicrous that it was used as the model of the botched early talkie film in SINGIN' IN THE RAIN.

Guess what! Gilbert's voice is perfectly fine. Instead, it's Miss Owen who offers an annoyingly bad performance, one a four-year-old might offer in reprimanding a stuffed bear at a tea party in her nursery. She may be excused in part because the dialogue is poor, but she spends most of her time gazing off to the left, seemingly unengaged with her fellow players. That must be blamed for the director of this movie, Lionel Barrymore.

This early talkie fails, not because of John Gilbert's voice, but because of the stiff, stagey performance of co-star Catherine Dale Owen as Princess Orsolini. In almost every scene she faces stiffly forward, slightly looking off camera left/stage right, and barely acknowledges anyone else in the scene. Her delivery is a one-note haughtiness as if the world must revolve around her and her apparent embarrassment at being made a fool of by the duplicitous Captain Kovacs (John Gilbert). All of the other main characters - her mother, the elderly Sargent or General who summons Captain Kovacs to her room, and Captain Kovacs, John Gilbert - play their parts naturally with believable reactions and vocal modulations.

"Singing in the Rain"'s mocking of this film is spot on in the Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen) character whose voice and mannerisms parody Catherine Dale Owen here, and in the awfully cheesy dialogue Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly) is given to deliver in his first talkie, "The Dueling Cavalier". Poor John Gilbert deserved better than this - his voice is fine, even as he plays his part in this overly melodramatic script.

I agree with the other reviewer "Not John Gilbert's Fault" that this movie fails, not through the fault of John Gilbert. It falls flat through a conspiracy of incompetence between the writer(s), the director, and Catherine Dale Owen. No wonder audiences laughed. The person whose career should have been ruined was the creator of the dialogue which is what is most funny about this "comedy" romance. And who was it that thought Catherine Dale Owen was an actress? Her cringe-worthy performance makes you wish someone would show up and plant a cream pie in her face. She and Nance O'Neil are the deadweight that sink this movie, aided by Lionel Barrymore who should have known better. I've loved old classic movies for many years so am well-practiced at suspension of disbelief and making allowances, but His Glorious Night is a hard watch even for me just as it was for audiences in 1929. As film history and a time capsule, it is fascinating, but not so great as entertainment. Even so, I'm glad this was restored and made available again.