Powerful

Absolutely brilliant

Blistering performances.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Copyright 7 June 1937 by Selznick International Pictures, Inc. Released through United Artists. New York opening at Radio City Music Hall, 22 April 1937 (ran 3 weeks). U.S. release: 30 April 1937. 12 reels. 111 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Unknown becomes star but finds that professional success doesn't bring domestic bliss.NOTES: Academy Award, Color Photography, W. Howard Greene. Academy Award, Original Story, William A. Wellman and Robert Carson (defeating Black Legion, In Old Chicago, The Life of Emile Zola, 100 Men and a Girl).Also nominated for Best Picture (The Life of Emile Zola), Best Actor, Fredric March (Spencer Tracy in Captains Courageous), Best Actress, Janet Gaynor (Luise Rainer in The Good Earth), Best Directing (Leo McCarey for The Awful Truth), Assistant Director (In Old Chicago), Screenplay (The Life of Emile Zola).Number 4 on The Film Daily annual poll of U.S. film critics. Negative cost: $1,221,382. Initial domestic rental gross: $2,550,000.Shooting commenced 31 October 1936 and finished 28 December 1936. Re-made in 1954 and again in 1976. The 1954 version starring Judy Garland, James Mason, Charles Bickford and Jack Carson, directed by George Cukor, is the best.COMMENT: A bit disappointing to see the original after all these years. Gaynor is no match for Judy Garland in the 1954 version. She looks far too old for the part. (She was in fact only 31, but the color camera is most unflattering. Nevertheless A Star Is Born was the high point of her professional career. Two films later, she married Adrian and retired, returning to the screen only once, co- starring with Pat Boone in the 1957 Bernadine.) The miscasting of Gaynor throws the whole film out of balance and off-key. March, however, does remarkably well and is more than a match for Mason in what is basically an unsympathetic part. We also much prefer Menjou to Bickford (a dull, heavy actor even at the best of times). Stander's vicious press agent is evenly matched with Jack Carson's 1954 interpretation. In each case, the role has been cleverly tailored by the writers to suit the player's distinctive personality. In fact, it's remarkable how closely the Garland remake follows the original script, merely eliminating the rustic background (and the May Robson role)* to make room for the musical numbers. All the same, the original screenplay doesn't have the sharpness, the wit, the incisiveness of the 1954 version and seems much tamer (and even duller) today than it was in 1937. The fault is compounded by Wellman's direction which is fairly straightforward and lacks the style Cukor brought to the later picture. Appealing color photography and great production values compensate.* Oddly enough, Selznick himself wanted to eliminate these scenes but was talked out of it by writer John Lee Mahin.

William A. Wellman's 1937 masterpiece "A Star Is Born" was one of the first movies to focus on the vicissitudes of fame. Janet Gaynor plays a farm girl who moves to Hollywood with the aim of becoming an actress. When she finally does, it happens as her lover's (Fredric March) career falls apart.The odd coloring helps to give a sense of the underbelly of all the glitz and glamor. It's inevitable that for one person's career to rise, another person's career must decline. The 1954 version starring Judy Garland and James Mason was much flashier but still managed to retain the original's spirit (I haven't seen the 1976 version starring Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson).This movie is undeniably one of cinema's all-time classics. Janet Gaynor and Fredric March are perfect in their roles. I recommend it.

A rising young Hollywood actress marries a washed-up alcoholic star in the original version of the story that was remade twice. While March is fine as usual as the actor whose boozing ruins his career, Gaynor seems all wrong in the role that Judy Garland made her own. Gaynor has neither the looks nor the charisma needed to make it believable that a movie star would fall flat for her or that the movie-going public would make her an overnight sensation. Menjou heads a good supporting cast that includes veteran character actors Stander and Devine in early roles. The cast also includes Robson, who was born thirty years before Hollywood was founded!

It took me a long time to get round to seeing this classic and perhaps my expectations were a little unrealistic but I struggled through this film. May Robson plays the role of grandma admirably enough, but the beginning was unbelievably corny and the dialogue throughout the film is not particularly sophisticated apart from a retort or two from Fredric March. Without March, I don't think I could have made it through to the end of the film. And I'm prepared to accept that Janet Gaynor is a great actress but she's so underwhelming as Vicki Lester. Judy Garland might not have been a stunner but as soon as she opened her voice to sing, all was forgiven. And I think Gaynor's casting makes the whole film's premise extremely difficult to believe. I remember reading more than once that this film is still one of the most accurate portrayals of Hollywood at the time and it definitely touches on the cruelty of the star system which sees one actor catapulted into the stratosphere while another falls from great heights into the gutter. However, I think there's a more cynical side to this movie's message. And that was to keep feeding the audience with the mantra that anyone can make it in movies, however "average" your looks or talent.