Wordiezett So much average

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

AnhartLinkin This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

SimonJack What a cast! What a movie! What a gem! Several reviewers discuss the fine roles and performances in this movie. It's a slice of small town America in the early 20th century. It's the only comedy by American playwright Eugene O'Neill. The play was a huge success, and so was this film. MGM promoted it like mad for the Oscars, but it didn't even receive a single Academy Award nomination. The cast is a fine mixture of prominent actors of the day and some young performers whose careers were just beginning. This film is adapted from O'Neill's play, "Ah, Wilderness: A Comedy of Recollection in Three Acts," that debuted Oct. 2, 1933, at the Guild Theater on Broadway. The story takes place on the Fourth of July, 1906. The place is New London or a similar town in Connecticut. The cast are mostly members of the Miller family and the story revolves around the middle son. Richard, who is 16 years old. Early writers often found inspiration for their works in classical literature. Some would use snippets from the tomes of time for phrases or titles of plays, stories or novels. O'Neill's title for this film came from Edward Fitzgerald's translation, "Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam." Richard recites quatrain 12 as a favorite poem of his. It reads: "A Book of Verses underneath the Bough, A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread-and Thou Beside me singing in the Wilderness- Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!"

jacobs-greenwood Co-produced and directed by Clarence Brown, with a screenplay by married couple Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett based on Eugene O'Neill's play, this above average comedy drama about family life just after the turn of the 20th century features a terrific cast that includes Wallace Beery, Lionel Barrymore, Aline MacMahon, Eric Linden, Cecilia Parker, Spring Byington, Mickey Rooney, Charley Grapewin, Frank Albertson, Edward Nugent, and Bonita Granville (among others). James Donlan, Tom Dugan, Eily Malyon, and Jed Prouty (among others) also appear, uncredited.Barrymore is the patriarch of the family, he runs the newspaper in small town America, 1906; Byington is his wife. Beery plays Byington's live-in brother who can't find a steady job per his drinking, MacMahon plays the family's cook (?) who maintains an "on again, off again" relationship with him. Albertson plays the oldest, college aged son, whose pal is played by Nugent. Rooney plays the youngest son who's younger than Mickey's 14 years, Granville is the only daughter. Linden plays the middle son, who's just graduated from high school along with his girlfriend Parker; Grapewin plays Parker's father.It's a coming of age story primarily focused on Linden's character, whose views on life are more liberal than those of his conservative family and in their community.Richard Miller (Linden) reads books that were considered racy, scandalous, or even subversive at the time: Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, Swinburne's poetry, and political tomes about the oppressed working man. This makes him somewhat out of place in the idyllic community in which he lives where his father Nat (Barrymore) runs the local paper. Richard's mother Essie (Byington) has asked Nat to take their son's subversive reading materials away from him. Regardless, Richard is the valedictorian of his class, and he's told his girlfriend Muriel McComber that he's going to use his high school graduation speech to expose the capitalist ways he deems are wrong. Fortunately for Richard, Nat is on stage to hand out the diplomas and, after reading his son's speech beforehand, interrupts his son just in time, to keep him from making a fool of himself and upsetting virtually everyone else there. Richard's odd ways have already alienated Muriel's father (Grapewin), who forces his daughter to write a "Dear John" letter to her boyfriend after he reads the corruptive poems Richard had written her. He also cancels his ad in Nat's paper, which means a considerable financial loss for the Millers.Nat's ne'er do well brother Sid (Beery), who had left their town where everyone already knows him (for his drinking and reputation) to take a job in another town, returns in time for the town's annual Fourth of July celebration. Tommy (Rooney), and the rest of the town's preteen boys, have been setting off firecrackers all day. Sid keeps the fact that he's lost his job, for presumably the same reasons, a secret by hiding his luggage in the front bushes, at least temporarily.Sid enters the Miller home to charm Lily Davis (MacMahon), who'd promised to finally marry him if he'd sober up and hold a respectable job. But after an evening of celebrating with Nat, Sid returns drunk on beer to join the Millers for dinner. Malyon plays the Miller's maid Nora. Nat says that Sid will be staying, that he's offered his brother a job on his paper. Unfortunately, Granville, playing the Miller's only daughter Mildred, isn't given much to do in this film besides laugh at Sid's drunkenness or rib her brothers, especially Richard.After receiving Muriel's letter, Richard accepts Wint's invitation to go out on the town with him and a couple of 'fast' girls. Wint (Nugent) had come by to go out with Richard's older brother Art (Albertson), but Art had another date playing tennis instead. Richard then finds himself in a hotel bar with a much older floozie named Belle (Helen Flint), who with the help of the bartender (Dugan) and encouragement from another patron (Donlan), gets him drunk and "extorts" some money from him. Richard returns home drunk, much to Mildred's delight and their parents dismay.Later, Belle gives a note describing her evening with Richard to Nat's office mate (Prouty), which leads to father and son conversation about "the birds and the bees" after Richard had insisted that nothing had happened the woman. Belle's motivation had been to get the bar's license revoked for serving a minor, after she had been unceremoniously thrown out of the place.In the end, Richard makes up with Muriel whose father has decided (for some reason) that he's not such a bad kid after all.

atlasmb Released in 1935, when the era before WWI held a nostalgic place in the hearts of viewers, "Ah, Wilderness!" relives a spring and summer in the lives of a small town American family, especially one son who is the high school's valedictorian.Adapted from the play by Eugene O'Neill, the film is filled with vignettes that recall life in 1906. The bandstand on the town square, the new-fangled Stanley Steamer, playing the piano in the parlor. Although some characters are more like caricatures, there is a sweetness to the film that culminates in the final, poignant scene.Mickey Rooney plays the younger, rambunctious brother. In 1948, he will appear in the musical version of the story, "Summer Holiday", as the graduating student, Richard.The cast is excellent, with Wallace Beery playing Uncle Sid, a lovable souse without the willpower to live up to the moral standards of the times. You can't have a film about turn of the century America without including healthy helpings of moralizing. Things were changing quickly in newly industrialized America and society seemed very concerned about pinning down community standards for decency and probity.Eric Linden does a fine job as Richard, full of potential and full of youthful earnest, so sure that only he--having read certain books--sees truth.

Wayne119 Eugene O'Neill wrote only one comedy, and this screen version of it is delightful. It treats some of the same problems as his tragedies, like alcoholism, but treats them lightly and with compassion. The cast is great. I especially like Lionel Barrymore as the father, Wallace Beery as Sid, and Aline MacMahon as Lily--but Mickey Rooney as the little brother dominates every scene he is in. My favorite scene is where the family is at dinner and Uncle Sid comes home drunk. They are concerned for him but can't keep from laughing at the nutty things he says.After seeing this movie, I bought a CD of the Broadway musical version, "Take Me Along," and a video of a Hollywood musical version, "Summer Holiday." This is such a great play, they can't do too many different versions of it.(My brother-in-law - who doesn't even LIKE movies - liked "Ah, Wilderness!" when I showed it for him and my sister on a recent visit.)