evanston_dad A handsome costume drama given the famous MGM polish that stars Norma Shearer as sickly Elizabeth Barrett and Fredric March as famous poet Robert Browning whose wooing of Elizabeth gets her out of her sick bed and out from under the thumb of her domineering father (Charles Laughton).This is a pretty static film; almost the entire thing takes place in one room. But it's got good actors who know how to sell this kind of inconsequential romantic fluff, and Shearer in particular makes any movie more interesting just by being on the screen. She was one of the best actresses of the early sound period in my opinion, and though she's never mentioned with the likes of Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn, Marlon Brando, and others who revolutionized screen acting, I think she deserves to be in her own way. She brought a naturalistic style to her acting that bridged the gap between the exaggerated mannerisms of the silents and the method acting that would hit the screen many years later. Margaret O'Sullivan is also a lot of fun as Shearer's feisty sister."The Barretts of Wimpole Street" received two Academy Award nominations in 1934: Outstanding Production and Best Actress for Shearer, her third of five ultimate career nominations and a record at the time.Grade: B+

pittzepmets Ho-hum. 1934 wasn't exactly a stellar year for Best Picture nominees. After It Happened One Night - considered a classic by many - and perhaps the even better The Thin Man, there is nothing much worthy of the honor and The Barretts of Wimpole Street is among them.The biggest problem with this film from the outset is it's just not a interesting story. In fact, it's extremely uninteresting. If the real romance between Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning generated sparks, it fails to flicker here despite the marquee cast, which includes Norma Shearer, Frederic March. Maureen O'Sullivan and the late, great Charles Laughton. Simply put, the story just never clicks and the film never develops any kind of credible depth to the characters or the relationships between them.The performances by Shearer, O'Sullivan and Laughton are generally fine, though by no means their best work. Laughton is a little over the top in the role of the overbearing, controlling father. March's performance as Robert Browning comes across as hackneyed and even a bit forced. Worse, there is no semblance of chemistry between him and Shearer's Elizabeth. The relationship between Browning's sister Henrietta (played by O'Sullivan) and the captain is not persuasive either. So, what are we left with? A typical, early era Hollywood film that just doesn't hold up if it ever did in the first place. Unless you have a bucket list like I do to watch every BP nominee, this is one you can comfortably pass up.

trimmerb1234 Charles Laughton was unmatched in larger-than-life monster roles, physical or emotional grotesques. Surrounded by stars, he outshone and certainly upstaged them all. And what a range too? The soft-hearted sentimental Hunchback of Notre Dame, the ultimate aloof aristocratic villain Squire Trelawney in Daphne DuMauriers tale of Cornish smugglers, the overbearing, over-drinking Lancashire patriarch in the comic Hobsons Choice.Nobody matched Laughton, nobody played them half as well. Here,what would otherwise have been a nice family of happy siblings is instead daily terrorised by a bullying obsessive jealous widower.What might have been a pleasant life is made one of stress as their reasonable expectations of a happy life are thwarted by the strange exactions of one man: their father.Lives that could have been pleasant and in the main unexceptional are dominated by him. But it is the eldest daughter who receives most of her father's attention who rather than lose her, instead insists that she is an invalid and must remain bed-ridden.Dramatically, the entire world of this family of 10 is dominated - and animated - by the single figure of this domineering monster played by Laughton. It is, after this, a fairly simple tale of the unalloyed good and brave daughter (played by Hollyood darling Norma Shearer) who rebels and against this tyrant and is able to go on to have a distinguished life with nice young suitor, poet Robert Browning (Frederic March in this for him an unchallenging role. March had elsewhere played one of cinema's most memorable monsters: Mr Hyde). Norma Shearer rebels not only on her own behalf but also for her siblings too so that they can all live normal fulfilled lives. Not just for her own domestic happiness but also for her artistic freedom, against the the tyranny of this lone monster who would crush them all. It was Laughton who admitted that the look that he gave his daughter (Shearer) should have earned the film an X certificate - it conveyed the very mixed and complicated emotions of this very odd Victorian disciplinarian pater familias.

MartinHafer This film was later remade by the same director twenty-three years later using nearly the same script. In fact, they are so similar that I definitely would NOT recommend you watch both--it would be way too repetitive. So, instead, I think you should watch this one. My biggest reason is I rarely like remakes unless there was something wrong with the original film and I know it takes little energy or talent to just remake an idea and script that already exist. Plus, in a case like this where two of the stars do such a great job compared to those in the remake (Charles Laughton as the over-controlling patriarch of the family instead of John Gielgud, and Frederic March as the love-struck Robert Browning instead of the totally unknown Bill Travers in the remake). I think that Jennifer Jones might have done a marginally better job than Norma Shearer in the original, but it's awfully close to tell. There have also been two made for TV versions, though I have never seen them and unless the story is much different, I have no desire to see them.Once again, why see a re-tread when the original is a very, very good film.