Disturbing yet enthralling

Brilliant and touching

Awesome Movie

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

A movie begins with the words. In this case the words of the immortal Charles Dickens (and this is once when saying someone is immortal that it's not an exaggeration). But then, screen writes must take the words in the novel and condense the story down to about 2 hours of film. And it is that step that makes or breaks many a film. And here it was done brilliantly. And I really mean that. When you think of all that is in the novel "A Tale Of Two Cities", the screen writers here were able to successfully sift all those contents down into what was the crux of the story.Next is the cast. And here, the highly respected Ronald Colman, a unique actor, plays...NOT Ronald Colman. The famed mustache is missing. Instead of being sophisticated he is a drunkard (albeit one with a heart and character). In the Colman biography written by his daughter, it is said that for these reasons, this was, perhaps, Colman's favorite film. As you watch the film, however, you realize that the screen writers knew that the film was not about Sydney Carton, it was about the French Revolution. So although it is a Colman starring vehicle, his screen time is what the story demands, not what a movie star demanded. Make no mistake, here, Colman is Sydney Carton.The excellence in casting is not restricted to Colman. Elizabeth Allan is perfect as Lucie Manette. Character actress Edna May Oliver has one of her most engaging roles as Miss Pross, Lucie's servant. Blanche Yurka is a truly menacing Madame Defarge. Henry Walthall is exceptional as Dr. Manette. Walter Catlett is appropriately talented as Barsad. Claude Gillingwater is perfect as Jarvis Lorry, banker and friend of the family. H. B. Warner is unforgettable as Gabelle, the servant of an aristocrat. And, toward the very end of the film, Isabel Jewell is stunning as the Seamstress about to be executed...a brief, but memorable performance (the first few times I saw this film I thought it was an early performance by Lana Turner). Donald Woods' role as the husband-in-law of Dr. Manette and descendant of a French aristocrat has been criticized in reviews for his performance, but I'm not so sure that he's that bad; it's just that everyone else is so darned good.Should we be surprised that this is a near-perfect film? Let's see, producer -- David O. Selznick. Primary star -- Ronald Colman. Director -- Jack Conway (perhaps his finest film). Studio -- MGM.And the ending. Tastefully done. ""It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known." Perfection on film.

A great film. The best film adaptation of Charles Dickens with the possible exception of the 1951 version of A Christmas Carol. A Tale of Two Cities is perhaps the most overlooked classic film of the 30s. Dodsworth would be in that discussion too. Ronald Colma is brilliant as Sydney Carton, a clever but troubled barrister. Basil Rathbone is excellent as the heartless Marquis St. Evermonde. And even Isabel Jewel is good in the tiny part of a dainty, sacred, and condemned seamstress.I'm not sure why this movie is not as well-known as films such as Grand Hotel, The Thin Man, or My Man Godfrey. Maybe it has to do with the lack of big-name cast members. Or maybe the movie simply has to be given another 80 years before it's given its due. All I know is that I have I'm glad it's in my small film library.

With the exception of David Copperfield this is probably Hollywood's most accomplished treatment of a Charles Dickens work. Sumptuously mounted and produced in grand MGM style it has the the perfect voice and charm of Ronald Colman as Sidney Carton, a stalwart supporting cast and magnificently choreographed large scale crowd scenes depicting the out of control energy and fury of the revolt and subsequent reign of terror. Colman's charming cynic wins us over early given he is surrounded by just cause with a Dicken's roster of pompous bores and hypocrites caught up in their own self importance. He drinks and offends but who can blame him. The sardonic wit of the film extends beyond Carton though by way of Dickens "cinematic" descriptive style that sharply conveys through both character and setting distracting dark humor over the grim proceedings by intermingling comic portraits with the sober cruel personages while making incisive social commentary. A laudable supporting cast consisting of Reginald Owen, Edna May Oliver, Billy Bevan, Blanche Yurka's Madame DeFarge and Basil Rathbone's venal Marquis de Evermonde truly do bring the pages to life, though I will admit an Oliver, Yurka death match near the end does take liberties with the tome. Oliver Marsh's photography is commendable throughout whether conveying panorama in the excellently edited storming of the Bastille and raucous courtroom scenes or the tight tension filled cramped ominously lit interiors of cells or the De Farge wine shop. With Colman in the lead and every MGM department clicking on all cylinders Tale of Two Cities remains fresh and vital 75 years later. It is one of those rear films that embraces rather than wrestle with a classic literary work which it does here with grandeur and confidence.

A Tale of Two Cities is an outstanding example of a film which in memory seemed great and a classic, but when seen again is just a classic. That's not faint praise, either. Jack Conway may be listed as director, but make no mistake...this is David O. Selznick's film. It carries his strengths with great emotional impact, but it carries Selznick's flaws just as emphatically. Thanks to Charles Dickens, we have a hugely empathetic tale of noble sacrifice and redemption, played out against the extremes of injustice represented by the French Revolution. Thanks to Selznick, that story has been brought to life with cinematic fervor, strong actors, melodramatic situations, vast and detailed settings, and a screenplay which may run for over two hours but which never loses our interest. But Selznick was a man who was convinced that if one blow of the cinematic hammer could drive a nail home, then two or three more would naturally do the job better. And so at regular intervals we have characters, major and minor, over-acting. We are left in absolutely no doubt of the nobility of the noble of the heart; how evil the evil are; how dedicated and chirpy the servants are; or when we should tear up, or smile at amusing antics, or be repulsed by the evil madness of the revolutionaries. Selznick even employs message cards to remind us where we are and what we should be feeling, a technique that went out of fashion with the death of the silent movies. Still, A Tale of Two Cities is undoubtedly a classic of movie making. Thanks to Dickens and to Ronald Colman as Sydney Carlton, thanks to some vivid casting, thanks to a great mise en scene, as they say, and thanks to Selznick's showmanship and craft, one would have to be a cynic among cynics not to be carried away by Carlton's sadness and his natural nobility. Just as importantly, you'd have to be dead in the heart and head not to be moved by his sacrifice, at how Carlton redeems himself for a friend and the woman they both love. "This I know," he tells Lucie Manette one afternoon. "I would embrace any sacrifice for you and for those dear to you. Will you hold me in your mind as being ardent and sincere in this one thing? Think now and then that there is a man who would give his life to keep a life you love beside you?" The courage he gives a young seamstress as they prepare to meet their deaths, the drum roll for the blade to descend, his walk up the stairs to the guillotine, those last words as the camera moves up from the crowds, up past the blade and up to the sunlit clouds...well, I was choking back tears. The ending is melodramatic, flawed for me by a syrupy score and by the over-acting of the young woman playing the seamstress. But, I'll tell you, it works. It's Sydney Carlton who drives the movie. Without a first-rate actor with whom we can empathize and admire, the part would either be awash in self-pity or simply become tiresome. Ronald Colman may seem a bit old fashioned now. We've come to expect our heroes to be much more direct, younger and less idealistically romantic. Colman exuded breeding and intelligence even when he was sword-fighting. He made no enemies of men and he gave women someone to dream about. His portrayal of the dissolute, drunken, self-loathing Carlton never falls into simple sloshing about or petulance. He can see himself with a clear eye and a sense of ironic understanding. He makes Carlton not only a man who has wasted his talents and his life, but a man who we are willing to believe is able to find redemption. That redemption is the unexpected love for Lucie Manette that even extends to deliberately sacrificing of himself to save the man Lucie Manette loves. His love for her is that great. Selznick peopled his film with vivid caricatures. Some work, some don't. The greasy, revolutionary enthusiasts of the guillotine all begin to look and act alike. The haughty, mannered French aristos are so self-centered we wind up kind of admiring them, and the last scenes showing some of them being noble in the face of the blade is a little phony. Still, Basil Rathbone as the Marquis St. Evremonde wearing a white, powdered wig is a sight to enjoy. His concern for his horses, after they've just run down a peasant boy, is touching. "It's extraordinary to me that you people cannot take care of yourselves and your children," he says, with impeccable Rathbonian diction. "One or the other of you is forever in the way. How do you know what injury you might do to my horses?" And Blanche Yurka as Madame Defarge should make us all extremely wary of women who knit. A Tale of Two Cities is nothing less than a marvelous, coarsened Selznick "literary" production. It remains an immensely watchable film. If it fails at being "great," it certainly ranks after seventy years as a classic.