It's not necessarily bad. It depends on what you're looking for. Mrs. Carey, Fay Bainter, loses her husband in the Spanish-American War and is forced to try living on a government pension. She has four children -- her "chickens" -- and of course it's a nuisance but her husband was after all a Navy Captain (four stripes) KIA and it can't be ALL bad.
Well, in this movie it is all bad because the Carey family want to move into a mansion that looks like Tara in "Gone With the Wind." They can't afford to buy it so they rent it from the property manager, the toothless Walter Brennan.
Mrs. Carey adds to the family income by working in a factory, pretending to be working as a nanny with an easy job. The fantasy ends when her hand is injured in the textile mill and she must drop out of the labor force.
Meanwhile, there is a lowly Latin schoolteacher who takes a shine to one of the Carey daughters (Ruby Keeler and Anne Shirly). But like all teachers of the time, he makes peanuts and can't afford a wife.
The youngish man of the family turns down an offer from a wealthy but stern aunt to send him to "Andover", which is presumably Phillips Academy at Andover, a prestigious prep school attended by Bush I and II, among many other notables. No. He decides to stay with the family and work instead.
The tribulations accumulate, overwhelm. The Latin teacher is in love with the wrong daughter. The son of the guy who owns Tara is a doctor and acts like a lawyer. He sells the mansion out from under the family after they've invested (sob) all kind of effort in furnishing and painting the thing, initially a wreck, and there's this little boy of five or six. He has a pet goat and sings cute songs and (sob) he gets sick and the family gathers around the (sob) bedside and (sob) I don't know what all. I'm too choked up to go on.
It ends happily.
I thought Anne Shirley was really pretty in a way that conforms strictly to convention, kind of like Donna Reed. Who could fault that face? It looks as if you had sat down a cartoonist and said, "Draw me a pretty face" without providing him with any model. That face has only one distinguishing characteristic -- its nose. It's what my dictionary calls "aquiline" or "eagle-like". Or, in common parlance, it's a little prominent. But it's attractive as all get out. Any normal man would want to pounce on that nose and bite it and chew on it.
Ruby Keeler is no dramatic actress and it shows. No other performers stand out in this tale that alternates between farcical tragedy and farcical triumph. Except maybe two. Margaret Hamilton as the wicked witch.
And that little boy. What a NUISANCE he is, singing songs and cutely adorning the walls with haphazardly applied paper. But here's a good test of public response to this entire movie. If you can appreciate a scene in which the cute little boy is suffering (from some unidentified but genteel disease) and surrounded by his praying family and the concerned doctor, and he speaks weakly and says things like, "Read that excerpt from Henry Miller again," you'll like the entire movie.
A story of bravery and solidarity and faith in the face of adversity.
Ugh.
Well, in this movie it is all bad because the Carey family want to move into a mansion that looks like Tara in "Gone With the Wind." They can't afford to buy it so they rent it from the property manager, the toothless Walter Brennan.
Mrs. Carey adds to the family income by working in a factory, pretending to be working as a nanny with an easy job. The fantasy ends when her hand is injured in the textile mill and she must drop out of the labor force.
Meanwhile, there is a lowly Latin schoolteacher who takes a shine to one of the Carey daughters (Ruby Keeler and Anne Shirly). But like all teachers of the time, he makes peanuts and can't afford a wife.
The youngish man of the family turns down an offer from a wealthy but stern aunt to send him to "Andover", which is presumably Phillips Academy at Andover, a prestigious prep school attended by Bush I and II, among many other notables. No. He decides to stay with the family and work instead.
The tribulations accumulate, overwhelm. The Latin teacher is in love with the wrong daughter. The son of the guy who owns Tara is a doctor and acts like a lawyer. He sells the mansion out from under the family after they've invested (sob) all kind of effort in furnishing and painting the thing, initially a wreck, and there's this little boy of five or six. He has a pet goat and sings cute songs and (sob) he gets sick and the family gathers around the (sob) bedside and (sob) I don't know what all. I'm too choked up to go on.
It ends happily.
I thought Anne Shirley was really pretty in a way that conforms strictly to convention, kind of like Donna Reed. Who could fault that face? It looks as if you had sat down a cartoonist and said, "Draw me a pretty face" without providing him with any model. That face has only one distinguishing characteristic -- its nose. It's what my dictionary calls "aquiline" or "eagle-like". Or, in common parlance, it's a little prominent. But it's attractive as all get out. Any normal man would want to pounce on that nose and bite it and chew on it.
Ruby Keeler is no dramatic actress and it shows. No other performers stand out in this tale that alternates between farcical tragedy and farcical triumph. Except maybe two. Margaret Hamilton as the wicked witch.
And that little boy. What a NUISANCE he is, singing songs and cutely adorning the walls with haphazardly applied paper. But here's a good test of public response to this entire movie. If you can appreciate a scene in which the cute little boy is suffering (from some unidentified but genteel disease) and surrounded by his praying family and the concerned doctor, and he speaks weakly and says things like, "Read that excerpt from Henry Miller again," you'll like the entire movie.
A story of bravery and solidarity and faith in the face of adversity.
Ugh.