Depending on which version of Back Street you watch first, that will be the one you stick with and compare all the others to. It's a very powerful and romantic story, and with great acting in all three versions, it's easy to become attached. I saw the original 1932 version first, with Irene Dunne and John Boles, so I'm partial to the way they handled the story. If you start with the 1961 version, starring Susan Hayward and John Gavin, you'll be in for a real treat!
John Gavin, a returning soldier from WWII, sees Susan Hayward at a dance and thinks she's very pretty. Not hard to believe that; Suzy's beautiful. Their next encounter is at a hotel. Susan's an aspiring fashion designer and naively believes a bigwig will look at her sketches if she goes to his hotel room. While she's never struck me as being particularly book smart, she's always seemed to have street smarts, so it's a little odd that she's so stupid at the beginning of this movie. John rescues her from an unsavory situation, and over a late night cup of coffee, they fall in love.
The title of Back Street means that their love affair has to be hidden and stashed away in the back streets, the bad part of town where mistresses are more common than respectable girls. In the original version, the married man sets his love up in an apartment, pays her expenses, and she sacrifices her entire life waiting for the times he can sneak away from his family. Irene Dunne has no friends and no job. In the Susan Hayward version, she's portrayed as living an extremely fulfilling life, almost like she's the one having John Gavin on the side. She has a busy and eventful life in the fashion industry that takes her to Europe and provides her with a wonderful income. It's a deviation from the original story, but the movie is still a tearjerker. It's a Susan Hayward movie-of course you're going to cry! Rent it if you like Love Affair or An Affair to Remember, and get ready for another classic Susan Hayward melodrama.
John Gavin, a returning soldier from WWII, sees Susan Hayward at a dance and thinks she's very pretty. Not hard to believe that; Suzy's beautiful. Their next encounter is at a hotel. Susan's an aspiring fashion designer and naively believes a bigwig will look at her sketches if she goes to his hotel room. While she's never struck me as being particularly book smart, she's always seemed to have street smarts, so it's a little odd that she's so stupid at the beginning of this movie. John rescues her from an unsavory situation, and over a late night cup of coffee, they fall in love.
The title of Back Street means that their love affair has to be hidden and stashed away in the back streets, the bad part of town where mistresses are more common than respectable girls. In the original version, the married man sets his love up in an apartment, pays her expenses, and she sacrifices her entire life waiting for the times he can sneak away from his family. Irene Dunne has no friends and no job. In the Susan Hayward version, she's portrayed as living an extremely fulfilling life, almost like she's the one having John Gavin on the side. She has a busy and eventful life in the fashion industry that takes her to Europe and provides her with a wonderful income. It's a deviation from the original story, but the movie is still a tearjerker. It's a Susan Hayward movie-of course you're going to cry! Rent it if you like Love Affair or An Affair to Remember, and get ready for another classic Susan Hayward melodrama.