Customer Reviews

Man I Love [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Ida Lupino shines in this 40s era tale of music, love, woe, and choices. Robert Alda turns in a well-honed performance as the gangster who woos but never wins Ida, a nightclub torch singer. The musical numbers are well-produced and memorable in timeless, classic fashion.

"The Man I Love" is a marvelous vehicle to display the talents of Lupino, who plays "Petie" with a blend of toughness and tenderness that will win you over. The movie is a blend also, of ordinary pot-boiler plotting and luminous, subtle touches that make it well worth seeing. Recommended!

Ida Lupino stars as a tough torch singer who comes to the aid of her family, all the while trying to deal with her own heartbreak. One sister, Andrea King, is trying to raise her son while her husband, John Ridgely, recovers from the War in a psychiatric ward. Another sister, Martha Vickers, is afraid to start dating/living life. Her brother, Warren Douglas, is working for a gangster, Robert Alda, and getting himself into tighter and tighter situations. Then there is the couple across the hall, Dolores Moran and Don McGuire, whose personal problems spill over into the family as well. And while all that is happening, Lupino embarks on a difficult romance with Bruce Bennett, a troubled pianist worn down by life. Obviously Ida has got her hands full. Lupino is very good in the central role, able to mix toughness with tenderness in a way that few actresses can. Alda is surprisingly good as the gangster who uses everyone, but can't get Ida to fall in love with him the way he has fallen for her. The rest of the cast are strong as well. I like the way director Raoul Walsh starts the film off with the great rendition of "The Man I Love", which helps to set a mood and atmosphere. The film gives the viewer a real sense of life in 1946 in Los Angeles.Walsh always paced his films well, and he keeps this film moving, giving it an edge that it needs. Watch how Ida manhandles McGuire at the end! Although the music, direction, and supporting performances are all important to the film's success, it is ultimately Ida Lupino that makes this film work.

The Man I Love is a rather hard-boiled soaper in the vein of Mildred Pierce. There is both too little plot and too much plot, but a brief summation would read thus: Ida Lupino uses her wit, wisdom, toughness and trailer-park pulchritude to solve all her family's problems in 90 minutes. There's also plenty of time set aside for musical interludes (some great, some ehh), so actually she solves them in more like 70.

This film paints its picture in very broad strokes: so much is touched upon and so little is dwelt upon that the story is never tremendously involving, despite all the things that it does well and all its charm. I'm all for a quick-pace, but this is sort of like the Classics Illustrated version of a better, more detailed movie.

Ida plays a world-weary torch singer (Hey, she's better than Britney) who leaves New York for LA, and immediately becomes involved in a myriad of soapy situations. Her younger sister watches over the brood, without the help of her war hero husband, who is currently suffering from war fatigue in an Army hospital. Ida sees that situation through, and does more. She helps her youngest sister get dolled up and go on a date (although she neeeded no help, IMHO); she steers her brother away from a life of crime; gets a job as a singer for the gangster who was corrupting her brother; and prevents a couple of murders, one by slapping around an armed man. She even makes time to assist the couple across the hall, by helping to heal his injured hand and wising him up to her infidelity. Along the way she flirts with several men, and falls for a burned-out piano player who can't truly reciprocate because his ex took with her "the best part of him" (no comments from you). After all this, her work done, she leaves her family for parts unknown, like a female Shane. But not before seeing the Man She Loves onto his boat and giving him time to rip off a famous line from Casablanca.

There is some good dialogue, oodles of class, some tenderness and some toughness. There are also a few risqué bits - for 1946 - the censors must have missed. (Ida and the gangster each seem to be wearing wedding rings; the gangster is an unrepentant wolf; the lady across the hall is none to too happy to have kids and thinks very little of them, hinting marriage was only necessary.) This movie likely would have been dynamite if made in, say, 1933, prior to the Hays Code.

The whole cast is good. But Alda's gangster (bringing to mind Richard Conte in The Big Combo) and, of course, Lupino, stand out. Neither Bette nor Joan could have done this quite as well as Ida. In addition, Walsh's direction is exemplary without ever being intrusive; he's one of the most underrated helmsmen ever.

However, Martha Vickers, as the youngest sister, is wasted. She played Carmen in The Big Sleep, and never got the opportunities due her after that; maybe she was just too darn cute. Alan Hale (as the gangster's kindly second-banana) is wasted even more than Vickers, given only a minute or so of screen time and two great lines. Overall the film just tries to do too much, and squanders much potential.

Enjoyable but never inspiring, this movie is as hackneyed as this review turned out to be. My apologies.

See also: The movies aforementioned; Road House (1948); They Drive By Night; Dance, Fools, Dance; The Bureau of Missing Persons; the Thin Man Series; This Gun For Hire.

THE MAN I LOVE is hurt by having too many subplots going on at once. As a consequence the viewer is apt to get bogged down just trying to keep the various threads straight. However, there are still good reasons to see the film. Ida Lupino is superb in her role as a motherly older sister and night club torch singer. The thoroughly competent cast is another reason. It includes Robert Alda, Andrea King, Bruce Bennett, Martha Vickers and Craig Stevens.

The music by George Gershwin, Jerome Kern and Johnny Green is excellent. It may not be the best effort by director Raoul Walsh but the touch of his genius can always be felt in any of his movies.

Raoul Walsh reportedly appreciated Ida Lupino because of her no nonsense approach to acting. She never came to the set with a lot of extra agendas.

Warner Brothers had so many first rate leading actresses under contract in the forties that it was clearly hard to provide good material for them all. A number of their films mixed heavy dramatics and music. "The Man I Love" contains bits from maybe every 40's melodrama which Warners ever produced.

Ida Lupino plays a singer who visits her family and sorts out their lives. At the same time, she falls for a broken down pianist. The plot covers many cliches but the amazing thing is that Lupino holds it all together and it works. She is tough, funny, tender and emotional, one after the other. All the cast are competent. Robert Alda is much better here as a nightclub owner than in other films when he was miscast and the relationship between Lupino and sister Andrea King is very touching. The actresses show a great rapport.

Special mention must be made of Lupino's superb lip-synching to Peg La Centra's smoky voice. The opening sequence in the nightclub when the musicians jam "The Man I Love" after a late night surely was copied by George Cukor with Judy Garland in "A Star is Born". It is one of the best openings to ANY film I have ever seen.

I don't remember if I originated the designation of 'chick noir' to this film or I had heard this before, but it is certainly a tear jerker par excelence, which includes some interesting elements. First, we have Ida Lupino at her best. In fact, all we have to see is just the first 10 minutes when Ida belts the classic Gershwin tune 'The Man I Love', while smoking (Camel?) in a smoke filled nightclub in New York. This is film noir at its best. The rest of the movie takes place in Long Beach, CA where I have lived for 35 years. It was a different world then, full of nightclubs and broken hearts. Ida's family problems in Long Beach are every woman's delight. Forget Madam X, this is the real stuff, sister. But what about us dudes? If you are a noir lover I promise you a nostalgic and entertaining movie.

I'm in agreement with the other reviews that have been posted here. One point I'd like to add to them is that the person who designed the graphic for the cassette box should be hung up by his toes and flogged. The picture makes it look like an "I Love Lucy" episode, and that's as far as can be from an accurate characterization of the movie. The Ida Lupino character is one tough cookie. At one point she stands up to an armed and hysterical man who's intent on shooting her companion; she shoves him against a wall and slaps him forehand and backhand until he crumples to the floor sobbing. I don't think Lucille Ball hardly ever did that. :-)

I've seen this movie described as a "noir chick film," and that's accurate. It gets a little soapy in its profusion of subplots, but overall it's a strong and interesting movie with an intriguing lead character who may change your notions of how women could be portrayed in the late '40s.