Letty Lynton
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (1932) Dir. Clarence Brown
84 min. / B&W / 1.37:1 / SDH
Warner Archive BD $24.98
Available from our partner Movie Zyng
Rarely has a classic film arrived with such anticipation and yet still -exceeded all expectations; this is a wow of a Pre-Code, a movie that even today would be considered shocking (and maybe tasteless, if we as modern filmgoers still have taste, which I sometimes wonder).
Joan Crawford, in early superstar mode, is a bored socialite with a horrid mother, so she escapes to South America with her lady-in-waiting, May Robson, to have a little fun with greasy boyfriend Nils Asther, but tiring of him she sneaks aboard a ship to sail home and try being a “good girl” again. Well, the stateroom over there right across the hall just happens to have handsome Robert Montgomery, as rich and bored as she is, and that’s a match made in heaven, or at least on Fifth Avenue. It’s quite a trip home, he treats her like a lady, and they fall in love ***sigh*** but greasy Nils is waiting for Joan on the dock; he has no intention of letting her leave him, and has plenty of ammunition to threaten with: she wrote him quite a number of lascivious letters, it seems, all of which he carefully preserved. She has a bit of heavy artillery herself, though: a nice, big bottle of poison. It gets used, but on him or on herself? And what does the horrid mother think of all this?
The backstory here is that, although ostensibly based on a novel by Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes that was inspired by a notorious true story, MGM was sued for plagiarism because the plot of the film followed closely a 1930 play called Dishonored Lady, and MGM – surprisingly – chose not to settle and ended up losing. When the Code era came in, the Studio wouldn’t have been able to re-release the film anyway and so it was never revived and apparently not shown on television or anywhere else, making it one of the most rarely seen non-lost films of the golden era. Reports are that Joan Crawford’s grandson kept his eye on the Dishonored Lady copyright and when it expired, convinced Warners, owner of the film these days, it could be released. Their legal department agreed, and so where we are.
It’s a highly-entertaining Pre-Code find, and Joan went right from this to Grand Hotel and never looked back. The film has obviously been well cared for even in its vault state; it looks like new and indeed, it is as far as we’re concerned. In great Hollywood style, the sets and gowns are breathtaking, including the famous Adrian gowns; knock-offs of the Letty Lynton dress became Great Depression best sellers.
Letty Lynton is a wonderful picture and one of the best Blu-ray releases of the year. Bonus material includes the 1-hour documentary Irving Thalberg – Prince of Hollywood, and several of Miss Crawford guest appearances on various radio variety and drama shows of the late 1930s, including an adaptation of A Doll’s House. We freely admit that we miss the musical and cartoon bonuses but this was a good month for Warner Archive releases and there are plenty of short subjects to enjoy on those.
This is a must-have.
