A Free Soul (1931)

Clark Gable plays a mobster who falls for his lawyer's daughter (Norma Shearer). She falls for him too, finding him more exciting than her current beau (Leslie Howard).  Lionel Barrymore plays her father, an alcoholic, who isn't happy about his daughter mixed up with Gable. Her family doesn't approve either, and won't even let her back in the house when the affair goes on too long. Shearer enjoys the thrill of the romance, even after she's almost killed by rival mobsters shooting at Gable in his car. Gable is great in this movie, and is one of his last "supporting" roles.

Lionel Barrymore won the Oscar for Best Actor in a great performance as the alcoholic lawyer who tries to go sober but struggles to do so. In one scene, he gets so drunk that he wanders off on a freight train and gets lost. In another scene, someone jokingly slaps him on the back and he reacts by saying, "Who's that - John L. Sullivan?" I had to look that person up to know who he was talking about; Sullivan was a boxer who was famous around the early 1900s.

The movie has a surprise twist near the end.

Directed by Clarence Brown. Highly Recommended

This was the first movie I watched on Warner Archive Instant, a new streaming service that is like Netflix, but features only Warner Archive titles. It's in a "beta" testing phase right now, and I was able to watch it for free. Once the service kicks off, I would be interested in subscribing - there are some great titles available!

Other blog reviews about this movie:
Booze Movies (review of A Free Soul)

Top 10 British movie stars of 1943

It has come to my attention that Kendra of Viv and Larry is moving to London this week. A perfect occasion to post the Top 10 box office stars from 1943 British made films, the results of a poll conducted among British exhibitors that year. The list was featured in the 1943 International Motion Picture Almanac; a hat tip goes out to Matthew of Movie Tone News for a fascinating post he did on the Almanac.

The rankings are as follows:

1. George Formby

2. Leslie Howard

3. Noel Coward

4. Eric Portman

5. Robert Donat

6. Arthur Lucan

7. Margaret Lockwood

8. Anton Wolbrook

9. Arthur Askey

10. John Mills

Leslie Howard to be Honored in Spain with WW2 Monument

April 18 2009 - the Associated Press reported that a Spanish historical association based in Madrid plans to erect a monument near where Leslie Howard's plane was shot down by Nazi fighter pilots duringn WW2. The Royal Green Jackets association and author Jose Rey Ximena will unveil the propeller-shaped sculpture in July 2009 near Cedeira bearing the names of Howard and the others who died aboard the commercial flight from Portugal to Britain in 1943. Association President Manuel Santiago Arenas Roca says the London-born Howard joined the Allies and campaigned hard against the Axis powers. Ximena said Saturday that Germany's government at the time apparently was worried about the negative impact the high-profile actor-director's anti-Nazi publicity was having on its cause.

One of Leslie Howard's greatest films was the Oscar-winning, pro-British, anti-Nazi film "The 49th Parallel" co-starring Lawrence Olivier and Glynis Johns.

Leslie Howard (1893-1943) is best known for playing Ashley Wilkes in Gone With the Wind. He was nominated for Best Actor for 1938's Pygmalion as Profession Higgins. He also starred in "The Petrified Forest" and "The Invaders/49th Parallel". For more about Leslie Howard, visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leslie_Howard_(actor)