67 of 68 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Splendid Movie, September 25, 2002
This review is from: Dodsworth (DVD)
Actors build up their characters at very close perfection in this outstanding film, which deals with the conflicts of a middleaged married american couple in an european-second-honeymoon trip. One wonders how such a poignant, adult film, could be made under the strictures of the Production Code, which reigned supreme from 1934.
The cast is uniformly flawless: Walter Huston, as industrialist Sam Dodsworth, gives one of the most sincere and unaffected performances ever achieved by an actor on the american screen (he deserved an Academy Award for this role); lovely and very pretty Mary Astor, in a most sympatthetic role, as an american widow living in Naples, Italy, who falls in love with Huston, realizing they're soulmates; Ruth Chatterton, as Fran Dodsworth, the self-centered, snobbish, selfish, spoiled, manipulative, unnerving & ultimately flirtatious wife of Huston, who cannot cope with growing old and ends looking down on her husband, hometown friends, way of life, etc....yearning for the "european"chic & sophisticated ways of its idle upper classes; Paul Lukas, as the suave, continental man who uses his charms on Chatterton; David Niven, as one of Chatterton's suitors; a very young John Payne, as the Dodsworths' son-in-law; and character actress Madame Maria Ouspenskaya, making her american debut, as the old baroness who spoils Chatterton's wedding plans to her much younger son Kurt (played by Gregory Gaye), who not only is an impoverished nobleman, but cannot make decisions of his very own!
Samuel Goldwyn, the legendary and indomitable Hollywood producer, must be given the praise for making the decision to film such a delicate and sensitive movie, with an "A" class treatment, in spite of its lack of commercial punch for regular `30s moviegoers.
Really one of the best Hollywood movies of all time, and a truly timeless 1930s classic. Buying this dvd has been one of the smartest investments of my adult life.
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20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Director William Wyler Scores Again, July 30, 2000
I was surprised by how honestly and maturely this film dealt with its subject matter of a marriage slowly falling apart. It's not what I expected to see coming from 1930's Hollywood. Walter Huston and Ruth Chatterton star as the Dodsworths, a wealthy American couple who go to Europe after his retirement, and while there, discover how little they have in common with each other, and how quickly they are growing apart. She is a vain woman who wants to regain her youth and live a glamourous life, while he is a practical man who wants meaning to his life. Huston is excellent as the conflicted husband, while Chatterton unsubtly tackles her unlikeable character with some success. Mary Astor is terrific (as always) as the woman that Dodsworth should be with. Dodswoth's pain at his disintegrating marriage and life is honestly portrayed, and the ending is very satisfying. This is a terrific film from start to finish, and audiences today will find it both relevant and accurate.
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22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A movie for a desert isle...., December 22, 2003
If I can only have one movie to take with me to that proverbial desert isle, I pick this one. The play between Walter Huston and Ruth Chatterton is really something to see...they gave the best performances of their careers here (and I love Chatterton in a little-known Pre-Code film called "Lilly Turner" which you should definitely seek out). The script VASTLY improves upon the book by Sinclair Lewis, and fleshes out the part of, to quote Chatterton, "that washed-out ex-patriate" played by Mary Astor. Praised in its day for its maturity and its sumptuous production, it is still an absolutely perfect film. The final 5 minutes show what an intense climax a director can create from a relatively tiny story.
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