It's a challenge deciding what aspect of this picture is more atrocious.
This doesn't work an any level. As a comedy it's as funny as reading a European Directive on building product design and as a romance, it's as romantic as a PowerPoint presentation on that aforementioned directive. The story is too ridiculous to be any way believable and all the characters are horrible.
It's difficult to enjoy something when the characters are so unlikeable. Madeline Carroll is usually great in her early Gaumont films but not in this. Her character is not someone you would want as a friend or even an acquaintance. She's only 27 but has the personality of a frosty old spinster from a Victorian gothic melodrama. Or rather an 'un-personality' because she's totally lifeless, shallow and characterless.
Ivor Novello was an acclaimed composer and the acknowledged king of musical theatre but he wasn't an actor. That he had staring roles in films is similar to what happens today when we find a famous rock or pop star appearing in modern movies. He's really quite awful!
If she was a passenger on a train which you were a conductor on, she'd be the sort who'd try to get you sacked for inappropriate behaviour if you even smiled at her. I can't envisage anyone being less likely to be attracted to a conductor.
Unbelievably the unlikely pair develop into a sort of 'item.' Normally in these types of things, when two stock characters get together something happens to them. Their characters change, one either becomes a nicer person or maybe one sees the error of their former ways - think Fred and Ginger. These two however stay exactly the same: just as unpleasant and just as mismatched.
Production-wise the film looks classy and is nicely photographed but because it's impossible to engage with, you just want it to end. Often in early 30s pictures the leads are fine but the supporting actors let the whole thing down. It's the opposite problem here - everyone is fine except Madeline Carroll and Ivor Novello.
It's difficult to enjoy something when the characters are so unlikeable. Madeline Carroll is usually great in her early Gaumont films but not in this. Her character is not someone you would want as a friend or even an acquaintance. She's only 27 but has the personality of a frosty old spinster from a Victorian gothic melodrama. Or rather an 'un-personality' because she's totally lifeless, shallow and characterless.
Ivor Novello was an acclaimed composer and the acknowledged king of musical theatre but he wasn't an actor. That he had staring roles in films is similar to what happens today when we find a famous rock or pop star appearing in modern movies. He's really quite awful!
If she was a passenger on a train which you were a conductor on, she'd be the sort who'd try to get you sacked for inappropriate behaviour if you even smiled at her. I can't envisage anyone being less likely to be attracted to a conductor.
Unbelievably the unlikely pair develop into a sort of 'item.' Normally in these types of things, when two stock characters get together something happens to them. Their characters change, one either becomes a nicer person or maybe one sees the error of their former ways - think Fred and Ginger. These two however stay exactly the same: just as unpleasant and just as mismatched.
Production-wise the film looks classy and is nicely photographed but because it's impossible to engage with, you just want it to end. Often in early 30s pictures the leads are fine but the supporting actors let the whole thing down. It's the opposite problem here - everyone is fine except Madeline Carroll and Ivor Novello.
- 1930s_Time_Machine
- Apr 26, 2023