Too much of everything

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

This was John Huston's second film as director after The Maltese Falcon. In this one, he guided Bette Davis and Olivia de Havilland as sisters with the usually male names of Stanley and Roy, respectively. Ms. Davis steals her sibling's husband (Dennis Morgan) while Roy then takes a shine to Stanley's former beau played by George Brent. Later on, some kind of accident occurs and someone gets blamed who was nowhere near the scene. I'll stop there and just say this was quite an exciting melodrama especially when Ms. Davis is on screen with her scenery chewing, so to speak! As the young African-American who gets in trouble through no fault of his own, Ernest Anderson holds his own against the other players. Oh, and what a nice reunion between Gone with the Wind co-stars de Havilland and Hattie McDaniel. In summary, In This Our Life was movie soap at its finest!

Everything about this film is awesome, beginning with its cast and ending with a spectacular and appropriate ending! Bette Davis, Dennis Morgan, George Brent, Olivia De Havilland, Hattie McDaniel and Billie Burke are some of my favorite lead and character actors and actresses. I can understand the controversy over this picture when it was released simply because the depiction of Negro testimony v. white testimony was accurate for its time, and not far from the way the judicial system still works in certain areas of the United States. Ernest Parry should have received a supporting actor nomination, but that would have been an unrealistic expectation, since Hattie McDaniel had recently received a supporting actress Academy Award for her performance in "Gone With The Wind." I understand from some sources that there were complaints about B.D.'s hairstyles and clothing, but she wasn't playing someone that was filthy rich, as in many of her roles, but a instead a southern gold digger.

Bette Davis chews up the scenery along with most of her co-stars in this fabulously fun melodrama. As Stanley Timberlake, she plays a character with absolutely no redeeming value in this engrossing Warners film from 1942. Olivia de Havilland, playing good sister Roy Timberlake, gives a believable performance, though, if Bette were my sister, I would have done something about her years ago. The film is justly celebrated for it's depiction of racial prejudice as well as it's positive portrayal of African-Americans, something very rare in 1942. The DVD hosts a cornicopia of special features including the theatrical trailer, two Technicolor shorts, one patriotic, the other a beautiful Ballet Russe number, an incomprehensible news reel minus most of it's sound, and a pretty funny Porky Pig cartoon. The film transfer is excellent, with great picture and sound quality, and the quality highlight of the special features is the aforementioned ballet short, in the most gorgeous Technicolor, perfectly restored and presented here.

With a phalanx of enablers a wide eyed Bette Davis leaves a path of deception, death and destruction as she roars through this Warners melodrama directed by John Huston. Davis is a spoiled whirlwind (celebrated these days in shows like My Sweet 16 and Bridezilla) as she steals husbands, betrays family and exploits the incestuous hunger of a rich uncle with worse to come.On the eve of her marriage to activist lawyer Craig Fleming (George Brent) Stanley Timberlake (Davis) runs off with her sister Roy's (Olivia DeHavilland) husband. Tiring of this she destroys him and heads back home to a sympathetic family. Once forgiven and re-established it's back to old tricks for Stanley.Bow lipped Bette doesn't blink once as she let's nothing stand in her way to get what she wants. Rages, hissy fits (including a brief Kate Hepburn imitation) define Stanley from the outset and Davis as a twentieth century version of her Jezebel character hammers it home with brio. Over the top and outrageous from beginning to end it's vintage Bette and she dominates the screen. Brent, DeHavilland, Billie Burke, Frank Craven and Dennis Morgan support and suffer the whimsical monster nobly while Charles Coburn, in the most powerful and disturbing role of his career as the lascivious uncle matches her venality.Director Huston and writer Howard Koch infuse In This Our Life with more than the standard Warner weeper melodramatic twists adding dark undertones of perverse desire and destructive self denial that strikes at the underpinnings of the American family. In spite of a loving family Stanley is little more than a feral animal, coldly self absorbed. All the men are weak with the exception of Coburn, a bellowing degenerate exploiter. The Timberlake wives remain in the throes of nervous breakdowns while the daughters male names beg for analogy. Life in it's own way and time is as provocative and disturbing as Huston's Reflections in a Golden Eye made a quarter of a century later in a more relaxed state of censorship. For his part Huston who usually deals with strong, independent males simply reverses the roles here while maintaining his sterling ability to reveal character through setting and angle. Southern based he renders without stridency or stereotype the second class citizenry of the Black American during the period, subtly and effectively injecting it into a crucial part of the plot. Not an easy feat to accomplish in the face of entitled hurricane Bette.