I've watched a number of Raoul Walsh features and they generally live up to his reputation for directing very masculine, action-packed films. This movie is probably a rarity in his career focusing as it does on relationships and more than that revolving the plot around a strong and sympathetic female leading character.
It also takes its thematic tone from the great Gershwin brothers song which as well as giving the movie its title, reappears frequently in the course of its running time, in so doing informing the viewer that the subject of unrequited love will play a major part in what transpires. Ida Lupino is the confident young cabaret singer who comes back to town to visit her siblings and their partners over the Christmas and New Year period. As well as trying to sort out their lives, she also has to deal with the sleazy attentions of a sharp-dressed, wealthy night-club owner, played by Robert Alda, at whose place she sings for her supper.
Then she bumps into her dream man, Bruce Bennett's moody but gifted pianist and it would seem that they could make sweet music together, if only he could get over his recently divorced ex-wife. Thus Lupino is both the pursued and pursuer. There are also sub-plots involving her sister trying to rebuild her marriage to her battle-scarred husband, a hard-working family friend next door whose wife is cheating on him and Lupino's feckless kid brother, keen to please his boss Alda but who finds his loyalties conflicted when he's ordered to clear up the boss's mess after he gets tangled with said floozy wife. It's not giving too much away I think to say that most of these situations don't play out well for the participants.
I have to say right here that my opinion of Lupino has fallen markedly since I learned that she turned informer in the Blacklist Era, but can't deny she holds the movie together with a bravura performance. I also liked Bennett as her world-weary quarry and actually would have liked him to have had more screen time. Sure the ending is a little like "Casablanca" in reverse, indeed I'm sure I've heard some of the dialogue here before in the Bogart / Bergman classic but as they say, if you're going to steal, you might as well steal from the best.
All in all this, is a thoughtful and effective examination of a group of disparate people struggling with their lives in the immediate post-war era. As Lupino's determined march towards the camera in the closing shot makes clear, all you can do sometimes is play the hand you're dealt and make the best of it. This may may not exactly be a grand slam or royal flush of a movie, but the pairs of hearts which are played out here make this movie something of a diamond in the rough.
It also takes its thematic tone from the great Gershwin brothers song which as well as giving the movie its title, reappears frequently in the course of its running time, in so doing informing the viewer that the subject of unrequited love will play a major part in what transpires. Ida Lupino is the confident young cabaret singer who comes back to town to visit her siblings and their partners over the Christmas and New Year period. As well as trying to sort out their lives, she also has to deal with the sleazy attentions of a sharp-dressed, wealthy night-club owner, played by Robert Alda, at whose place she sings for her supper.
Then she bumps into her dream man, Bruce Bennett's moody but gifted pianist and it would seem that they could make sweet music together, if only he could get over his recently divorced ex-wife. Thus Lupino is both the pursued and pursuer. There are also sub-plots involving her sister trying to rebuild her marriage to her battle-scarred husband, a hard-working family friend next door whose wife is cheating on him and Lupino's feckless kid brother, keen to please his boss Alda but who finds his loyalties conflicted when he's ordered to clear up the boss's mess after he gets tangled with said floozy wife. It's not giving too much away I think to say that most of these situations don't play out well for the participants.
I have to say right here that my opinion of Lupino has fallen markedly since I learned that she turned informer in the Blacklist Era, but can't deny she holds the movie together with a bravura performance. I also liked Bennett as her world-weary quarry and actually would have liked him to have had more screen time. Sure the ending is a little like "Casablanca" in reverse, indeed I'm sure I've heard some of the dialogue here before in the Bogart / Bergman classic but as they say, if you're going to steal, you might as well steal from the best.
All in all this, is a thoughtful and effective examination of a group of disparate people struggling with their lives in the immediate post-war era. As Lupino's determined march towards the camera in the closing shot makes clear, all you can do sometimes is play the hand you're dealt and make the best of it. This may may not exactly be a grand slam or royal flush of a movie, but the pairs of hearts which are played out here make this movie something of a diamond in the rough.