Perfect cast and a good story

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Absolutely the worst movie.

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

As was the pattern of her career at this point Olivia DeHavilland was getting her best roles away from her home studio of Warner Brothers. No matter what she accomplished away from Warner be it an Oscar nomination for Gone With The Wind and for this film, Jack Warner resolutely refused to see her any heavy dramatic parts. His view of DeHavilland as the leading lady waiting patiently for her man to accomplish his mission remained transfixed throughout her tenure at Warner Brothers.I'm sure that given what she accomplished in Gone With The Wind, Warner got quite a sum from Paramount for her services for Hold Back The Dawn. In it Olivia plays a schoolteacher on holiday in Mexico with some boys from her class. But depending on your point of view she's unlucky enough or lucky enough to meet Charles Boyer who is a Romanian refugee wanting really bad to get to this country.Boyer is a part time tango dancer and full time gigolo and his partner Paulette Goddard has already gotten US citizenship by marrying a jockey from Agua Caliente racetrack and later divorcing him. She wants to resume her association with Boyer professionally and personally and Goddard urges him to romance some American tourist and do what he does best and get married.Which is when Olivia falls into Boyer's life. She's young and naive and full of illusions and he really starts to hate himself, romancing some worldly dowager for money is one thing, but Olivia's trust gets to him. He actually commits a sacrifice of sort in this relationship.Although DeHavilland got the Oscar nomination for me Boyer makes the film. The change that comes in his character come subtly and gradually and the tools to do it and the guidance come from script writers Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett and director Mitchell Leisen. Boyer gives a very subtle performance that should have received more recognition.Not to say Olivia didn't deserve her recognition coming in the form of that Oscar nomination for Best Actress. In fact she was the betting favorite to win, but her sister Joan Fontaine beat her out with her performance in Suspicion. As is part of movie legend these two sisters were quite competitive and this didn't help the relationship.In fact Hold Back The Dawn got six Oscar nominations including Best Picture, but came up short for Paramount. Still it's an impressive piece of work even seventy years after it was first released.Also note the performances of Walter Abel as the immigration official and Rosemary DeCamp another refugee who finds her own method of entrée into the good old USA.I hope it comes out on DVD at some point.

I voted this film 6/10 and saw it with a mixture of enjoyment and disappointment, so felt rather ambivalent about it.First the enjoyment, my prime purpose was to see the beautiful Paulette Goddard (who was about second in the running to play "Scarlet O'Hara" in 1939 - she did have a passing resemblance to Viv.)There were good location beach shots on the Mexican border with the USA and environs of Los Angeles.The studio got away from the claustrophobic 100% studio scenes which for reason of economy were often prevalent in Hollywood at the time.The screenplay had occasional flashes of intelligence in its writing and the scriptwriter remembered to add a line that sea water had to be flushed out of the car's cooling system (which I thought at the time was stupid when Charles Boyer is seen to put it into the car's radiator when the engine overheats).Now for the criticisms, first the dreadful stock interpretations and racist stereotype portrayals of Mexicans (and other foreign nationals) as rather childlike, indolent and rather stupid.I notice that even humble Mexicans doing manual jobs in US films always speak enough English to make themselves understood.Conversely how many American characters in US financed films are seen conversing in Spanish to Mexicans on their home soil?As I am married to a retired 63 year old school teacher, I can assure IMDb.com readers that no single teacher would be permitted to go on a school trip abroad especially without a TA to help.Teachers, far from the irritating stereotypes portrayed by film producers, are usually worldly characters and would be very unlikely to fall for the glib charms of a gigolo.They are kept busy doing lesson planning, meeting Government targets and other bureaucratic requirements,They certainly would not have enough time supervising a school trip to engage in personal romantic dalliances.Just interview any modern school teacher!I did not believe in Olivia de Havilland's character, especially the sickly sentimental final scene when she speaks to the immigration officer expunging all the moral guilt from Charles Boyer.Nevertheless my retired school teacher wife was engrossed throughout the film so I suppose for her it was mere escapism.P.S. she knows about my weakness for beautiful raven haired 1940s film actresses!

It is a sad reflection that many of the movies made so long ago still compare brilliantly with the best of today. "Hold Back the Dawn" is one of those - superbly put together by Billy Wilder & Charles Brackett, and with some of the finest acting of 1941. Outtanding are Charles Boyer, in what I feel is his best acting, and Olivia de Havilland who apparently had to go to Paramount to be appreciated (her two Oscar films were made there, and she was nominated also for this one!) is a standout. Paulette Goddard in a role almost written for her was very good, and the supporting cast was excellent. Migrants trying to get into the United States has always been a hot topic, but here it is treated sympathetically in a very informative way. I have to say the ending was not well done, and one gets the feeling all was not well somewhere.

Put Charles Boyer, Olivia DeHaviland and Paulette Goddard together in a film and you have terrific, sparkling performances. These three stars along with Rosemary DeCamp and Walter Abel in lesser roles make this melodrama believable and one of the best for Paramount Studios in 1941.Boyer, a Mexican gigolo, in an attempt to gain access to United States by way of marraige, weds Olivia, a school teacher, visiting the Mexican border town with a group of school boys, in a quick and sudden ceremony. Paulette, once Boyer's partner on the professional dance floor, attempts to win him back once he gains entrance to good old USA. However, as in most melodramas, the hero has an attack of conscience and tells his lady fair the truth. She leaves him, as does Paulette, only to find Boyer trying to get his story made into a film. A great scene on a movie soundstage with Veronica Lake and Brian Donley as themselves being directed by none other than Mitchell Leisen, who also diected this picture.Goddard shows great flair as Anita and according to Miss DeHaviland, was very nervous during the filming that her upper lip would tremble. But she survived and did a fine job. She was to make several more flicks under the directorial hand of Leisen. Most importantly KITTY.