If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

ADAM HAD FOUR SONS (Columbia, 1941), directed by Gregory Ratoff, could easily be mistaken for a Biblical story about Adam and Eve and their offsprings, starting with Cain and Abel, but it isn't. Taken from the novel "Legacy" by Charles Bonner, it's a turn of the century tale about a family man with a wife and four sons living in Connecticut, and how a French governess becomes part of their lives.The story begins in 1905 with the Stoddard family, consisting of Adam (Warner Baxter), Molly (Fay Wray), and their four sons, Jack (Billy Day), David (Steven Muller), Charles (Wallace Chadwell) and Philip (Bobby Walberg) posing for their family portrait. Later the Stoddards head for the train station to greet their new French governess, Emilie Gallatin (Ingrid Bergman). Surprised to find her so young, she immediately makes a good impression with the family. During a family Thanksgiving, Molly becomes ill and later dies. Adam, finding it hard to go on without his wife, sells his house, sends his boys, except for the youngest, away to school, but most of all, his hardest decision in sending Emilie back to her homeland. Years pass. With the Stoddard company a success, Adam purchases his former home and remodels it, but most of all, sends for Emilie to return to her former household position. It is now 1918 and the boys, David (Johnny Downs), Jack (Richard Denning), Philip (Charles Lind) and Charles (Robert Shaw) have grown to fine young men. The surprise comes when David returns home with Hester (Susan Hayward), his bride. Hester remains in the Stoddard home while David goes off to war. While the men like Hester, both Emilie and the visiting Cousin Phillipa (Helen Westley) take an immediate dislike to her, for reasons of their own. Their hunches are proved correct when the family becomes more divided than together because of Hester, and it's now up to Emilie to do something about it before it is too late. June Lockhart (Vance), the girl next door who likes Philip; Pietro Sosso (Otto); Gilbert Emery (Doctor Lane); Renie Riano (Miss Bonson); Clarence Muse and William B. Davidson also complete the cast.A good story that, by today's standards, is completely underrated and forgotten through the passage of time. Maybe the title or fact that having the audience accept the Swedish born Ingrid Bergman playing a French governess instead of a Swedish one might have something to do with it. For her second movie role in America, Bergman was popular enough to award feature billing over such veteran performers as Warner Baxter and Fay Wray. While Bergman doesn't really age through the passage of time, at least Baxter gets his limited share of gray hair around his temples. Of the members of the cast, the one who gathers the most attention is the young and youthful Susan Hayward. Having been in movies for a short time, her role as Hester allows her to improve her ability as an actress, and make the most of it around such a capable cast before becoming a major actress herself by the end of the decade to the next. Another added bonus to this production is having the characters dress according to time frame rather than wearing 1941 costumes and headdresses for an early 1900s setting. One surprise is to how small Fay Wray's (star of the legendary 1933 classic KING KONG) role was for this production.A fine family film where the attention falling mostly Hayward's character, ADAM HAD FOUR SONS at least did get its share of revivals over the years through home video distributions as early as 1984, (much later on DVD), followed by rare cable broadcasts as Turner Network Television (TNT) in 1992, and Turner Classic Movies where the film has been showing occasionally since August 29, 2006. For anyone who's never seen nor heard of this movie, should give it a try. (***)

Apparently (so I have read) Susan Hayward's early career was stalled because more established actresses didn't like working with her - as she often stole the picture. And this movie is no exception, may be this is the one that started the rumour. "Susan Hayward gives it the works", "Hayward is excellent", "Susan Hayward is almost too emphatic for comfort" were some of the reviews praising her for her role as a faithless wife who almost destroys an entire family.Adam and Molly Stoddart (Warner Baxter and Fay Wray (looking beautiful)) hire a French governess (Ingrid Bergman) to take care of their sons. They all take to her instantly and she comes to care deeply for the family and also (as the movie progresses) to have feelings for the father. When Molly dies, Emilie goes back to France due to the family's dire financial situation but promises to return and does so, to help the four, now young men, through the stress of World War One. David (Johnny Downs) is the only brother not on hand to welcome Emilie back, but when he arrives he brings his new wife Hester (Susan Hayward) with him. Talk about throwing a cat among the pigeons!!! While charming all the men, she wastes no time in putting Emilie in her place - "I am Mistress of the House - I'm glad we understand each other". Emilie obviously can see through her as can Cousin Phillipa (Helen Westley)(but unfortunately she dies). With all the boys away at war Hester has time on her hands - until Jack (Richard Denning) gets leave!!! Jack is repulsed by Hester's amorous advances .. but not for long!!!This is Susan's movie all the way - without her it would be a pretty boring family saga with every player noble and self sacrificing - thank goodness for Susan!!! She has so many memorable moments - her first brawl - with Ingrid Bergman no less and when she fakes tears as a distraught Adam tries to comfort her, a scheming smile comes over her face. Wait, there's more!!! - when a disgruntled Jack tells her "I've never known a woman like you" she gets a vixenish look and says something like "Not in this family, but we're around" and of course her showdown with David when she laughs in his face and tells him she only married him for status and he'll never get rid of her etc, causing him to rush out into the rain and crash his plane!!!Susan almost didn't get the part. She had to beg for it but director Ratoff laughed at the idea -she had a firmly entrenched (in 1941) movie image as a sweet young thing. However his wife knew she could pull off the part and persuaded her husband to give Susan a chance. I'm very, very glad she did!!!Highly, Highly Recommended.

By 1941 Columbia was a full-fledged major studio and could produce a movie with the same technical polish as MGM, Paramount or Warners. That's the best thing that could be said about "Adam Had Four Sons," a leaden soap opera with almost terminally bland performances by Ingrid Bergman (top-billed for the first time in an American film) and Warner Baxter. Bergman plays a Frenchwoman (this was the era in which Hollywood thought one foreign accent was as good as another) hired as governess to Baxter's four sons and staying on (with one interruption caused by the stock-market crash of 1907) until the boys are grown men serving in World War I. Just about everyone in the movie is so goody-good it's a relief when Susan Hayward as the villainess enters midway through — she's about the only watchable person in the movie even though she's clearly channeling Bette Davis and Vivien Leigh; it's also the first in her long succession of alcoholic roles — but the script remains saccharine and the ending is utterly preposterous. No wonder Bergman turned down the similarly plotted "The Valley of Decision" four years later.

I only watched this film because Ingrid Bergman was in it. And because I Knew that Bergman wasn't fond of it, and that general opinion was so so, I expected it to not be up to much but I ended up being pleasantly surprised by how good a film it is. The performances are all good especially Bergman (of Course), Baxter and Heyward and the film cruises along at quick pace with no scenes dragging. If I have a problem with the film it's that it's a bit short at an 80 mins but apparently it was originally 108 mins, if this is true then it's shocking that over 25 mins were cut out. I'd like to know if it's possible to put the footage back in or if it has been destroyed. If it isn't destroyed then in the video age it should be released on video in it's original length. 9/10