Young Mr. Lincoln

Young Mr. Lincoln (John Ford, 1939)

A family traveling through New Salem, Illinois in their wagon need groceries from Lincoln's store and the only thing of value they have is a barrel of old books including a law book, "Blackstone's Commentaries." After thoroughly reading the book, Abe (Henry Fonda) opts for the law after receiving encouragement from his early, ill-fated love, Ann Rutledge (Pauline Moore).

Destry Rides Again

Destry Rides Again (George Marshall, 1939)

A young James Stewart plays the new deputy (Destry) in the little town of Bottleneck. The city has no real order and the criminals seem to runs the place (ain't talking about politicians here.. well). The Last Chance Saloon where Frenchie (Marlene Dietrich) is running a burlesque show and running the whole town.

The story of the film is set to let enough space to let the comedic elements of the film be exploited at their maximum. Well, far from being a great comedy like a Chaplin, Keaton or even Lubitsch Destry Rides Again is more like a farce into the Western genre. Well, some moments are sure laughs but relying only on that and on the thin story the film would not be worth it if you let Dietrich and Stewart apart of the whole film.

Some scenes are build up to take pretty images of Marlene Dietrich in sexy costumes. Good for the viewer, but it doesn't really help the story to go further. She was a beautiful woman but is it just me but I think she has "funny" eyes?

On the other side, James Stewart is in the first moments of his brilliant Western career and gives an regular good performance in this comedy.

Destry Rides Again is worth the look but not as good as many other Westerns I will be reviewing here in the future. Come back again this week I will be reviewing Anthony Mann's great Winchester '73.

A review by Michaël Parent

Leo McCarey's Love Affair

Love Affair (Leo McCarey, 1939)


From the recently repraised and rediscovered Leo McCarey, who's brilliant masterpiece Make Way For Tomorrow has been released by the great folks at Criterion Collection, it's like a cinephile revival of McCarey's films. Earlier this year Leonard Maltin was praising his masterpieces like Ruggles of Red Gap, Duck Soup, Love Affair, and Make Way For Tomorrow and many more.

Love Affair co-written and directed by Leo McCarey, photographed by Rudolf Maté and edited by Edward Dmytryk is wonderful gem of American 1930's Cinema. In the way Ernst Lubitsch made wonderful comedies, McCarey offered the audiences of the time many great comical and, read here, romance moments. Michel Mamet french playboy and singer Terry McKay met on a cruise, each is in a relationship but they quickly fall in love between Paris and New York. They agree to meet each other six months later on the top of the Empire State Building to decide if they are gonna marry together...

Made today it would have been a compleasant easy cliché movie full of sugar sweet moments, but made in the 1930's by a first class director like Leo McCarey, Love Affair has some classic cinematic moments and well, a Christmas time ending. I think it was "à la mode" to do that because Frank Capra's Meet John Doe has the same Christmas denouement. Don't get me wrong here, the endings are not the same at all but the same christmassy feeling is used here.

A nice little gem to discover if you liked Make Way For Tomorrow and if you want to dig a little deeper than just the regular box-office made for today romances...

A review by Michaël Parent