Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

Stometer Save your money for something good and enjoyable

XoWizIama Excellent adaptation.

Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

edwagreen A very good 1933 film with Mary Pickford and Leslie Howard.John and Mary love each other; though her obstinate parents want her to marry a British Lord. She flees with John to the frontier of California, the wild west. The picture makes a sharp turn and shows their life of desperation there as well as the old west phenomena: cattle rustling.The two emerge from such a thief and his brother. The years pass and as they become prominent, he rises in politics and is about to be elected governor; only scandal intervenes: the old fashioned scandal-other women.This film is revolutionary in that how it deals with the above subject and problems of domineering parents earlier on.The ending where the aged parents seem to be like children to their adult children is so appropriate in today's world.The wonderful Mary Pickford captures every moment of the young daughter in love; the run-away bride fighting for survival in a hostile frontier, success, scandal and ultimate redemption. She is well matched here by Leslie Howard; a man who fought for survival, had the world at his feet, but only to throw all away in near scandal. Howard shows many of the same traits as his famous portrayal of Ashley in "Gone With the Wind."

yumredwine This is an average movie as movies go and it is only the presence of the glorious Pickford and the fascinating Howard that makes it worth the while, not to mention of course the two scenes that everybody remembers, both of them by Pickford.Others have mentioned here and elsewhere that this movie was also a vehicle for Pickford to make a statement to her estranged husband Douglas Fairbanks, and his reply in his 1934 movie is the stuff of Hollywood legend, as was their relationship.This film is important for it being the last of Mary Pickford's many movies.We are fortunate to have still available many of Pickford's movies, stories about her films and acting from contemporary media and colleagues and her own interviews then and later.The extreme talent of Pickford is easily revealed by the fact that for twenty years the whole world was deeply in love with her (from China, to Russia to Australia), not just for what she was, a movie star, but for the person they thought she was through watching her movies. People were convinced that this acting Mary had to be the real Mary and that this acting Mary was a very special person indeed. It is testament to her skill that through silent films Mary could affect so many so deeply in such a way.She was attractive, a little short and dumpy at times but never the stereotypical tall glamorous elegant type.Mary was no fool, already a tough heavily traveled veteran of stage for 12 years by the time she came to film at the age of 17. A woman with her head screwed on tightly, deeply thoughtful and analytical and assertive. But equally as sweet and gentle and fun loving.Mary came into early film, saw how it looked and very early transformed it into something entirely new. Her gift was not only knowing how to act and convey a message in silence but when to apply what techniques, and art in itself.Her last movie Secrets gives a few looks at her skills though the movie itself was struggling with the new technology which badly affected its directing. Nevertheless, Mary was still the natural.Pickford was the first and last of the greats, in fact the only real great. All learned their art from her template. She was being Chaplin before Chaplin got going, she was at times a Katherine & Audrey Hepburn, she was the sweet and gentle Lillian Gish.Last of all she was one of the toughest businesswomen of the times, never intimidated. For two decades she was the heart of the nation.

MartinHafer I love Mary Pickford films and would list many of them among my very favorite silents. She was magnificent in gems such as DADDY LONG LEGS, SUDS, SPARROWS and MY BEST GIRL and is perhaps my favorite silent actress. However, I am NOT a "Kool-Aid drinker"--you know, a person that loves a star so much that I can't objectively review their films. This is the type person that gives every single one of the movies scores like 9 or 10! And, when I looked at the overall score for this (7.4) and some amazingly positive reviews, I knew I was in the land of Kool-Aid!The bottom line is that the talkies were not kind to Miss Pickford. Even though she received an Oscar for COQUETTE, she clearly didn't earn it for that performance. The Oscar was more an acknowledgment of her past film achievements. However, by 1933, it was obvious that America's Sweetheart was no longer a guaranteed box office draw and SECRETS fell flat in theaters. However, its failure wasn't due to Pickford this time as much as it was due to a terribly dull and episodic plot. Her acting here was actually better than COQUETTE, as at least she was believable and didn't put on a crazy accent--though she was rather old to play such a young girl. At 41, she played a woman who was probably about 16 at the beginning of the film--though she did a great job of making it all seem possible and this really didn't hurt the film.The movie seems very much like an Edna Ferber novel (such as CIMARRON)--a sweeping saga that is so grand and so bigger than life that the characters seem more like caricatures than real people. In particular, Leslie Howard comes off as rather wooden and tough to understand--especially since his personality in the film changes so wildly and unpredictably. In spite of this, Pickford stood by her man like Tammy Wynette and this hurts her character as well--making her seem like a sad door mat late in the film.The plot involves rich Easterners Pickford and Howard eloping and going West in the mid-nineteenth century. Pickford came from a rich family and gave up everything for her love. Once they arrive, life is hard but the film is engaging...for a while. The segment where they fight against cattle thieves and they lose their baby is reasonably well done and engaging--and none of the rest of the film is anything like it!! After this decent segment, the final half of the film is more like watching a highlights reel--with only very short snippets shown of various decades until the pair become old and decrepit. Amazingly, although this is dull and unsatisfying, the writers manage to make it worse by sticking in some pointless sexual peccadilloes that manage to make you wonder why you even care about the characters any more. The film would have been MUCH better had it stuck to a much briefer time span or if they'd filmed it as a series of two or three films. Shoving all this into 131 minutes was just impossible.The bottom line is that this film is a huge disappointment to fans and will do nothing to make those not in love with Pickford care a bit about her. Despite decent acting on her part, her character seems a bit desperate and stupid and her husband, Leslie Howard does an unconvincing job playing a human weasel! Don't bother with the film unless you are a die-hard fan or if you want to see Ned Sparks in one of his better supporting roles.

bkoganbing Mary Pickford's farewell to the screen was this film Secrets which seems like a cut rate version of Cimarron with a little bit of pre-Code infidelity thrown in. Whole chunks of the film I viewed tonight seem to have been edited out unfortunately and the viewer has to piece together what is missing.I will say that Pickford did give a good performance in her farewell film, she ages quite nicely from the young ingénue she normally plays all the way up to being a little old lady, a queen of Washington society besides.Her leading man in Secrets is Leslie Howard, an earnest young fellow in the employ of her father C. Aubrey Smith who's arranging a marriage with a stuffy English title in a suit. Mary's got eyes only for Howard though and they elope with proper ladder and all right out from under the noses of Smith, mother Blanche Fredirici, and the empty suit title Herbert Evans.Smith has the power to make sure Howard's name is mud in New England so Howard and Pickford go west by wagon train the way Yancey and Sabra Cravat do in Cimarron. Leslie Howard's as much not home on the range as he was in The Petrified Forest. But he does have grit and so does she. There's also a question of infidelity which would not have gotten by the Code in a couple of years. It reflects the real life marital problems that Pickford was having right about then with her storybook marriage to Douglas Fairbanks ending. On screen Howard is having a fling with Mona Maris and he mentions there've been others. Still Mary stands by her man, unlike in real life.One should see Secrets for no other reason than seeing Ned Sparks in the role of sidekick to Howard. He's less home on the range than Leslie. Who'd have thought both their screen credits would include a western or semi-western as the case may be.The way the musical score was played during the film it was very reminiscent of silent films. Probably something Mary Pickford arranged as she was the producer as well.Secrets is not a great film, though the stars perform more than adequately. It was too old fashioned for public taste when it was released in 1933, let alone now.