Women, The (1939)
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Director: George Cukor
Honors:
Over 100 roles in the picture and there is not one male
character to be seen, this is MGM’s production of The Women, a screen adaptation of a Broadway play with an all
female cast. It is a fast talking comedy with nothing but females, however as
the promotional material states it is all about men. More correctly the film is
about these ladies’ relationships surrounding men. It is a picture you can
either love or hate. It is sexist, filled with negative stereotypes that can be
entertaining as well as offensive depending on how one views it, but it is
actually a satire on the actions and relationships of women with their men and
each other.
The Women is a
comedy/drama of wealthy social women and how their lives, primarily their
social lives, are dictated by their relationships and affairs with men,
featuring an all female cast. The story centers around Mary Haines (Norma
Shearer) who discovers through her friend and fellow socialite and queen of
gossip Sylvia Fowler (Rosalind Russell) her husband is having an affair with a
perfume counter girl named Crystal Allen played by Joan Crawford. Humiliated
and against the advice of her mother and friends Mary hops a train to Reno for
a divorce, where she befriends many fellow divorcees, while discovering news of
her now ex-husband has now married Crystal. Years later Mary still regrets her
decision to divorce and discovers that Crystal is having an affair on the side,
which Mary allows to spread among the circle of gossips. The ending foreshadows
Crystal’s imminent divorce to Mr. Haines and Mary happiness that she will be returning
to his side.
The production is quite grand with the vast number of
players in the picture, large set decoration in a number of sequences, and hefty
amount of dialogue that just flies through the scenes. The picture pokes fun at
rich women with too much free time and how their lives are measured by the men
they marry and how happy they keep them. To more contemporary audiences this
could come off as very offensive towards women, but for the sake of the film
and its period, you must allow it to play out to even attempt to enjoy the
picture.
The ladies come off primarily as gossiping birds that chirp
little tib bits of information for the sake of conversation, making themselves
appear better than others. This is prevalent in the three main actresses’
characters. Rosalind Russell’s Sylvia is the antithesis of a gossip, gaining
her status purely with being in the know, or at least thinking she is. Joan
Crawford’s Crystal
is the social climber, unaffected by the idea she was an affair that brought he
up to the status of the female social elite in this tale. Norma Shearer is the
white lamb of the bunch. Humiliated she leaves her husband, heartbreakingly
explaining to her daughter of the divorce, and attempts to grow from this
experience, only to grow herself some figurative claws and gains her man back.
Down to the root of the movie The Women
is about social status and nothing else.
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| The Women, featuring a cast of... all women. |
The film is quite shallow, but it is perhaps from this
inherent simple-mindedness that made fans of so many through the years. Remember
this is a comedy and not a film to be taken seriously. The draw to the picture
was the all female cast. Shearer was the one of the best known starlets of the
30s. Crawford was box office poison, a controversial choice of actress, and an
easy villain of the tale, aiding to re-launch her career yet again. Rosalind
Russell begins to set her way in the movie industry as being a comedienne.
Other noteworthy performers included the somewhat cheerfully pompous character
actress Mary Boland, and the energetic Mrs. Chaplie Chaplin at that time,
Paulette Goddard.
All this commotion, comedy, and drama was directed by George
Cukor, who was known to be a fine women’s director, coxing notable performances
from his female cast members. His creativity with the film showcases a very
stylized look at this world for these women. The camera literally flies through
floors and walls in the opening sequence which takes place in a spa of these
luxurious women, setting the tone of the film. This scene portrays a feeling of
a lavish stage play with multiple layers and sets as the camera moves
throughout the stage revealing new rooms and hearing only snippets of dialogue
that grab the audiences’ attention before moving along. The style falls along
into a normal motion picture as the story picks up, but Cukor’s mastery of the
camera keeps things fresh when comedic, and dramatic when serious.
The most lavish of all the scenes in the picture was
actually one that Cukor despised the most. At one point in the first half of
this black and white film is a sequence in extravagant Technicolor displaying an
abundant fashion show, filled with large, colorful gowns played to symphonic music.
It could be likened to a Busby Berkley sequence, but with fabric, except not
quite that elaborate. The colors are beautiful, but the scene is completely
unnecessary to the overall scope of the feature. Cukor disliked the whole
scene, seeing it as poorly shot and a superfluous sequence to just have in the
middle of the movie. Not long after its release the sequence would be cut by
the director, but years later would be replaced by a black and white copy of
the scene before the full color arrangement returned.
The films creativity, comedy, and all female cast assisted in
making The Women one of the more
successful films of the year. Not up for any major awards in a highly
competitive year in cinema, the film would be elected to The National Film
Registry in 2007. The story would prove popular in an almost cult-like manner
later years. Two remakes of the story would be produced in the decades to come,
the musical comedy The Opposite Sex
in 1956/, as well as the 2008 re-envisioning for more contemporary audiences.
The Women would be
yet another pictured buried under the slew of great films produced in 1939, but
can make feminists of later audiences feel very uneasy. Filled with fashion,
pettiness, a cat fight, jealousy, and materialism The Women was not meant to be taken seriously. The comedy continues
to be discovered by new audiences who treasure the film for its flashy
production and over the top years after its release.
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