Brightlyme i know i wasted 90 mins of my life.

Supelice Dreadfully Boring

Lucia Ayala It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Allissa .Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

JohnHowardReid "Dramatic School" had a lot going for it. Luise Rainer, fresh from winning Hollywood's annual Academy Award for Best Actress for two years running (1936 and 1937) is here somewhat inappropriately cast as a ham actress. Worse still, the screenplay rewards the character's false histrionics with applause rather than ripe tomatoes. Bob Sinclair's direction also presents a problem. Admittedly, he takes the first quarter-hour at an admirably snappy pace, but once the stage is set and the script's rather routine plotting gains the upper hand, Sinclair obviously loses interest. At least the excellent photography by William Daniels always remains a constant. The movie is stunningly and most beautifully photographed from start to finish. Producer Mervyn LeRoy, fresh from his triumphs at Warner Brothers and now making his debut at M-G-M, has okayed some really lavish sets and costumes. Alas, all this doesn't add up to a good movie when a sizzling script and appropriate acting are lacking.

jjnxn-1 Luise Rainer wrapped up her Hollywood career with this minor B movie that also served as an early showcase for Lana Turner and Ann Rutherford.The Viennese Teardrop isn't bad but her habit of staring soulfully skyward comes across as a bit affected.Paulette Goddard co-stars but she was in a transitional phase. After having recently been elevated from the ranks by Chaplin and featured in Modern Times she was a bit ahead of the other girls career wise but this was still before her period as a top star although that was right around the corner. An interesting contrast can be made between the two other future stars featured. MGM was still experimenting with Lana and her look, her hair is still red not her signature blonde, her makeup is slightly different from scene to scene and her part is small although she is prominently billed. Ann Rutherford on the other hand who was at about the same point in her career already has her screen persona down. Of course she was always the girl next door so retained more of her natural attributes while by the time Lana reached the top there was little if anything girlish about her.The picture itself moves at a decent clip and is mildly entertaining but has several large reality gaps in its story line. It's filled with familiar faces though to distract you from the holes in the script with Genevieve Tobin and Marie Blake both adding nice touches in small roles.

ferenc_molnar It's somewhat indifferently directed but it has well drawn characters that the actors play to their advantage. Luise Rainer's romantic and urbane intensity can be off putting on film. She's too much of a stage actress and her Austrian accent, though charming, is too pronounced to successfully worm its way into our collective American movie-fan heart. We're always looking at her but we never start to look through her. Paulette Godard is great as a cynical fellow actress and rival to Rainer. She pulls off the moments where her hard boiled facade starts to crack beautifully. Another fantastic performance by character actor Henry Stephenson who has a scene where he has to tell his son that the he'll never be a decent actor because he doesn't have any talent. It's also great to see Lana Turner, who hadn't lost her baby fat yet, in a small role. But the surprise of the movie is how unsentimental it's take is on the realities of show business. Even thought the film pumps in the romantic music at the film's conclusion, it's clear to anyone who has been watching closely that Luise Rainer's character is not as ingenuous as she seems. Her character is a born actress and knows how to melt the hearts of not only an audience but anyone who stands in the way of her career.

MartinHafer It seems like I am the big meanie with this review. While several others were also not in love with this film, my views are the most negative. This film, despite its budget and MGM luster just didn't do much for me--mostly because the central character was rather tough to like.Luise Rainer played, or shall I say "over-played" the role of a young student in film school who works late at night to pay for schooling AND has an over-active imagination (i.e., she likes to lie a lot). One reviewer who loved this film (whitedudekickin) loved Ms. Rainer for exactly the same reasons I disliked her. He said that she was "...almost like a silent screen star with her exaggerated facial expressions". I just couldn't help but feel that the character she played wasn't real in any sense--like Rainer was pretending to be a young star-to-be instead of a real person. For example, when she talked to people, she tended to stare off in space and talk in a very detached way--like she was trying out for a play with each conversation. This performance was much more affected even than Garbo in CAMILLE. I would have MUCH preferred she acted more like a real person.An aspect of Rainer's character that was tough to take was that he was a habitual liar. Now had she panicked and lied (thus triggering a funny series of events), this could have worked. But Rainer lies throughout the film and yet the film wants the viewer to care about this lady. While Paulette Goddard's hard-as-nails character comes off as vicious, most of the time she is attacking Rainer, it is well-deserved--she IS a liar. Yet, time and again, the film rescues and rewards the waif-like Rainer from the quagmire created by her own lies. A great object lesson for the audience, huh?! As for the other actors, most actually did very well. Henry Stephenson is his usual affable self, Blossom Rock ('Grandmama' from "THE ADDAMS FAMILY" and also Jeanette MacDonald's real-life sister) has one of her best supporting performances and the ever-smooth Alan Marshal did so well as the handsome Marquis that you wonder why he didn't go on to stardom. But even with decent performances, they just couldn't make up for the film's inadequacies.A film that is often annoying and hard to take--you may just find yourself turning it off when the film becomes too schmaltzy and over-played. Do yourself a favor--skip this one and try finding STAGE DOOR. It tackles pretty much the same subject matter but in a much more enjoyable and realistic manner.