All This, and Heaven Too (1940)
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All This, and Heaven Too Movie Review
All This, and Heaven Too is a 1940 melodrama film directed by Anatole Litvak and starring Bette Davis and Charles Boyer. It’s an overlong, but very well done melodrama.
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“Happiness isn’t a little cake which
we can cut up to fill our appetites“
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Henriette starts teaching the kids of the Duc de Praslin and the possessive Duchesse de Praslin. But tragedy occurs when she is refused a recommendation letter and he begins to fall for her. All of this eventually of course led to a highly tragic, complicated conclusion in the best 40s melodrama way possible. Yes, for anyone who is a fan of this type of movie, this one is found to satisfy. I found it very enjoyable despite some obvious flaws.
For one, it’s way too long. The runtime is almost two and a half hours, and you can feel that time, in particular in the scenes with the kids, which are uniformly endearing and wonderful, but not all that necessary when you think about it. The plot is great for sure as it ended on an especially dark note, but it’s far from a particularly complex storyline, so this runtime was unreasonably extended.
My favorite scene is that opening. It proposes such genuinely juicy drama through the class girls gossiping that it was a perfect way to start a melodramatic storyline. This type of film that features an opening that becomes the ending while the large middle act is told in flashback form has always appealed to me and here it’s executed hugely successfully.
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Let’s talk about the key players in this production. First off, Barbara O’Neil. As a deeply jealous woman who spells her ultimate doom with her horrible mistrust of her husband, the character herself is definitely very interesting and the driving force for basically the film’s entire storyline. However, I found O’Neil’s performance highly overrated. She received an Oscar nomination for her work here, but to me she was too over-the-top way too often. It fitted the role, but still it was too unrestrained and loud, though definitely fun to witness.
The kids themselves are all cute and endearing. Charles Boyer is perfectly cast. He is always great in the roles of sweet-talking, suave and charming Frenchmen, thus this was the example of typecasting done right. His character is quite likable and the fact that the two never kiss made the movie unique and fueled by unrequited love and high passion that was never met.
As for Bette Davis, people usually forget that she acted in so many dramas where she was likable and positive, even a tragic heroine as is the case here. And the fact is – she’s actually as great in these roles as she is in the evil, bitchy ones. Apparently, many find her turn here among her weaker ones, but I wholeheartedly disagree. I felt her pain throughout and her inner suffering at all this injustice happening to her. That’s because she excelled in both her facial expressions and line delivery.
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All This, and Heaven Too is technically quite accomplished. The cinematography is gorgeous and quite sensual with the woods scenes being particularly charming. The production design, the direction and the score are all pretty good, but the dialogue, though strong, was overwhelming, and the movie could have used even more cinematic flourishes here and there to make it pop even more. Still, it’s mostly a satisfactory watch for anyone in the mood for juicy 40s drama.
