The Women (1939)

The Women
Directed by George Cukor
Anita Loos and Jane Murfin from the play by Claire Booth Luce
1939/USA
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/Loew’s Corporation
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Crystal Allen: There is a name for you, ladies, but it isn’t used in high society… outside of a kennel.[/box]

I’ve been looking forward to seeing this for some time. Although I enjoyed the bitchy one-liners, I was surprised at how misogynistic it was.

Mary (Norma Shearer) thinks she is happily married to Steve until her friends find out about his affair and gleefully tell her about it.  Cousin Sylvia (Rosalind Russell) is the ring-leader of the gang that ferrets out the identity of his paramour Crystal Allen (Joan Crawford).  Despite her mother’s advice to overlook the matter and Steve’s pleading, Mary feels too humiliated to stay in the marriage and heads off to Reno.  With her on the train are Miriam Aarons (Pauline Goddard) who is divorcing to marry her married lover, Peggy (Joan Fontaine) who is leaving because she didn’t get her own way, and the Countess de Lave who is on her fourth divorce.  By the time Mary comes to terms with the fact that she is still in love with Steve, he has married Crystal.  Will justice be meted out to all these characters?

The ladies (there is not a single male in sight) are all sensational and the dialogue is lively. I wasn’t happy about the tone of the movie in some way.  It seemed to me that women were portrayed as spiteful, petty, envious cats with few redeeming characteristics.  Only Mary comes off well and only because she ultimately returns to domesticity.  The fact that it was women doing this hatchet job made little difference to me.  It’s a movie worth seeing, though.  Any one interested in 30’s design should check out the Technicolor fashion show sequence.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZV0k77ih8Q

Trailer