Cheap Divorce of Lady X (1938) (Video) (Frank Capra) Price

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Customer Reviews of Divorce of Lady X (1938)

An Important American Film...
...but buyers should be forwarned that the print from which this DVD is made was a poor one, and Alpha Video, the distributors of this classic Capra movie, made no attempt to clean it up. <
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>Here we have an example of a key artwork about America's psychological and political framework during emergence from the economic depression of the 1930s, crying out for careful restration to the condition it so deserves.

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Endgame
The print looks like you're watching it through muddy water; is this something to do with the unclear "public domain" status of this and other of Capra's works? Doesn't he have a family that could help out his DVDs the way that Chaplin's family has done, or even, to use the opposite extreme, the family of Edgar Ulmer, who have released superlative versions of some pretty dicey movies? The point is that if people are paying for something they deserve to get it served up nice, and all the various DVDS of MEET JOHN DOE are painful to watch. <
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>We've heard for years of the re-worked ending of the film, and that another one exists (or existed at one time). Bring it on! For now the pleasure is nearly entirely in watching Gary Cooper react to Barbara Stanwyck's pure life. It's sort of like BALL OF FIRE but a bit more subtle. Moviemakers knew they were on to agood thing teaming the two, because Cooper's slow-moving, nearly snakelike screen presence got an injection of caffeine when placed next to Stanwyck's vibrant beauty and her gorgeous clear gaze and complexion. She doesn't even have to speak, she emanates something very basic in her bones and her posture. Okay, the movie writes itself into a corner, for what else is going to happen except that if Gary Cooper is not going to kill himself the movie will break the trust it's established with the viewers. This has always been DOE's problem, that it has to cheat to come out ahead of itself, and it didn't work in 1943 and it still isn't working now. It's great up until about an hour and fifteen minutes; then you feel the gears start to whine and complain as "Hollywood" tries to solve a basically philosophical dilemma.

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"Baseball's My Racket and I'm Stickin' To It"
"I've been lonely and hungry for something practically all my life." <
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>This Frank Capra film, unlike others he had made, leaned more towards drama than humor. Though there is humor, and many charming moments involving Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck, the tone of the Robert Riskin screenplay, based on a story by Richard Connell and Robert Presnell, has more serious implications than Capra's other films. For that reason, and perhaps because the prints of this film are not as good as the others, "Meet John Doe" sometimes gets unfairly dismissed when Capra's films are discussed. This was the meat in what many call "Capracorn." <
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>Barbara Stanwyck is Ann Mitchell, a reporter soon to be unemployed when her paper is gobbled up by D.B. Norton (Edward Arnold). Desparate to keep the thirty dollar a week salary that keeps her two young daughters and her mom (Spring Byington) afloat, she begs editor Henry Connell (James Gleason) for her job back, but her plea falls on deaf ears. She exits with a column that's a real doozy, pretending she has received a letter from a "John Doe" who, because of the injustice in the world, the state of civilization, and the downtrodden, plans to kill himself at Christmas. <
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>A groundswell of support for John Doe gets Ann her job back, but now she and boss Connell must find a "John Doe." In walks Long John Willoughby (Gary Cooper), a hungry baseball player with a bad wing. He and his pal, Colonel (Walter Brennan), are just hungry enough to play along. Colonel has reservations from the get-go, however, afraid that Long Johm will become a helot--a guy with a bank account. <
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>Long John just wants to earn enough to get the arm he injured pitching a 19 inning game fixed by Bonesetter Brown, but his shy affection for Ann keeps him around long enough to make a radio speech, written from words in her father's diary. His speach spreads the John Doe movement all across the country. It is the crusty Colonel who sees the train wreck coming, however, and takes off. <
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>Clubs start up everywhere, only the "little" people allowed to join. People start treating their neighbors with kindness, showing the spirit of Christmas on a day-to-day basis. D.B. Norton, however, has political aspirations, and sees a way to twist the movement to fit his ambitions. It is Henry Connell who clues in Long John on what is about to happen, letting the air out of his balloon and shattering his smitten image of Ann, with her chestnut hair and great legs.What follows, as the country discovers John Doe was a fake, will lead Long John to a rooftop overlooking the city on a snowy Christmas night. <
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>Stanwyck is wonderful here, as Ann slowly comes to realize she has found a man like her father but may have helped to destroy him. Cooper is memorable as Long John Willoughby, a shy ball player who realizes he has come to stand for more than he ever could have on the pitching mound. Brennan is his usual great character, looking out for Long John as much as he can. <
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>There are some warm and sentimental moments between Cooper's Long John and Stanwyck's Ann mixed in with the social drama, and some charm as well. Cooper's scene with Ann's mom, whose help he needs to ask her daughter to marry him, has a sweetness to it that is long gone from today's films. And the baseball scene in a hotel room, when they play pretend ball, is a classic. <
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>This is a wonderful film about the little guy that sometimes gets analyzed too much. All Capra was trying to do, was remind people that the first John Doe came a long time ago, and people still weren't listening. This is a film that works best if you forget it is a Frank Capra picture, and just enjoy it on its own merits. It can then be placed proudly beside the director's other classics on your movie shelf.