People are voting emotionally.

As Good As It Gets

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Although Skyscraper Souls develops several good characters, the primary focus is on Warren William the ruthless William Randolph Hearst like tycoon who is obsessed with not only building, but totally owning the world's tallest skyscraper. To emphasize the point of how big this building is, the New York City background shows the newly constructed Empire State Building quite a few feet shorter than Warren William's edifice.All the other characters in the film revolve around William like so many planets to his sun. Beginning with of course his long suffering wife Hedda Hopper and this may very well have been her best acting part, before she became one of the reigning gossip columnists of movie land. Hedda's not even trying to hold on to him other than financially, Warren just writes her check as she needs in and she keeps her free spending ways. The Marion Davies of the story is Verree Teasdale, William's eternal secretary/mistress who knows where all the bodies are buried in his business. A young woman working as a stenographer in his bank, Maureen O'Sullivan has captured William's attention, but Teasdale watches her like a mother hen and Teasdale's the jealous type. Young bank teller Norman Foster is courting Maureen, but he hasn't a prayer with William intruding on the picture.These are the personal associates, but the business ones are also revolve around William as he is determined to break any one who wants to gain control of his building. Chief among his rivals is George Barbier who is quite the rich womanizer himself, but is hardly in William's class for brains.Coming out in 1932 I'm not sure how the movie-going public took to this story about the rich playing with stocks, so many lost their own nest eggs to just such speculation. William is the kind of tycoon people loved to hate that year.The climax of Skyscraper Souls comes at a big price for William. He gets his edifice, but loses everything else. Let's just say it's quite the melodramatic ending, but still effective. Although the film is firmly dated in the Great Depression, Skyscraper Souls will still grab you by the emotions and by the wallet.

Maureen O'Sullivan was MGM's favourite ingenue and she was used quite frequently throughout the 30s. Her most famous role was as the refined Jane to Johnny Weismuller's Tarzan of the Apes but she was usually around as a sweet young thing in such high quality films as "The Thin Man" (1934), "The Barretts of Wimpole Street" (1934), "David Copperfield" (1935) and "Anna Karenina" (1936). "Skyscraper Souls" provides her with a different type of role. In this "Grand Hotel" of the business world she plays the mercenary Lynn who is drawn to Dwight and the luxury he can give her.Tom (Norman Foster), a brash and pretty obnoxious bank teller, tries to pick up pretty Lynn Harding (a ravishing Maureen O'Sullivan) but she doesn't fall for his "charms" - she only has eyes for her boss, the cold and ruthless David Dwight (Warren William). Sarah (Verree Teasdale) is Dwight's secretary and former mistress, who has taken Lynn under her wing. Dwight wants to merge with Seacoast Bank because he stands to lose his entire fortune if he doesn't - it means retrenchment of workers but he doesn't care!!! "The Flat-Iron Building....the Dwight building could put it in it's vest pocket"!! He sees that Sarah is looked after with a trust account of $100,000!!! Lynn works late and finds herself at Dwight's party, where he plies her with champagne until she forgets where she is and falls asleep in Dwight's bed. Sarah gives Tom a tip to put all his money in Seacoast shares - he has been complaining about the fact that he is too poor to tempt Lynn.Dwight, though, is going to sell short - and that sets the film up for a climax as the market fails and lives are ruined. Myra (Helen Coburn) is broke and goes to Slim (Wallace Ford) in desperation. Slim gambles on the stock market and loses everything and in his despair prepares to rob Jake (Jean Hersholt) a jeweller. Slim is accidentally locked in the time lock safe - he is dead when it is opened the next day. Helen Coburn must take the award as the most callous young woman in films. Desperate to get away from her husband Bill (who seems like a nice chap in the couple of scenes he has) she thinks nothing of going off with Bill and saying nothing about Slim, knowing that he is locked in the vault. Another couple, who do make a go of it are Jenny LeGrande (Anita Page) a model/prostitute and Jake, a jeweller. Typical racy dialogue exchange between them - Jake "you shouldn't gamble...I can afford it, I'm in a very old business", Jenny "Yeah?? Well so am I"!!!Sarah confronts Dwight about his involvement with Lynn - they are already planning to go away together with Lynn posing as his "ward". Of course at the end Lynn falls into Tom's arms - she has shown that she is completely mercenary and a gold-digger, so who knows if they will be happy. Warren William is his usual perfect self - he had a habit of playing ruthless, chauvinistic men ("Beauty and the Boss" (1932), "Upperworld" (1934)) but still making you like and admire him. Aside from Warren William, Verree Teasdale gave the best performance in the film as the loyal but cast off mistress.Highly, Highly Recommended.

This movie is a great example--of one of the best--of Pre-Code film-making in the early 1930s. Warren William plays an incredibly unscrupulous businessman who controls a high-rise building in New York. He's having an affair with his married assistant, lusts after secretary Maureen O'Sullivan, cheats all of his business partners, and illegally manipulates stock prices, leading to a startling and tragic end. There's also great support from Anita Page and Verree Teasdale.Along the way is some of the most raw and racy pre-Code stuff around, including leering sex and some very lively dialogue. My only objection is Norman Foster's character, who is so clumsy and oafish that he makes Jerry Lewis look tame by comparison. Still a great experience, just listen carefully for some very off-color remarks by William.

Back in the early 30's, Maureen O'Sullivan was the quintessential "good girl who wants to be bad", which is to say, she seemed prim and proper on the surface, but a powerfully sexy woman lay right underneath that surface, who would only come out for the right guy--or sometimes the wrong guy. Though she is not exactly the star of this movie, she did get second billing after Warren William, in spite of being so new to the motion picture biz. This was probably in response to her having appeared as Jane in the first Weissmuller Tarzan film, not long before. That remains her best role--she is essentially the protagonist in the first two Tarzan movies--she's the one who is changing, casting aside the sexual mores of her society, and joining Tarzan in his idyllic state of noble savagery.In the urban jungle of "Skyscraper Souls", she plays a less idyllic character, wanting to enjoy both sexual passion and social respectability, along with a decent income. Nobody can offer her everything she wants, so she's left with two imperfect choices--the poor young clerk she likes, who will offer marriage. And the sexy ruthless tycoon she REALLY likes, who will take her as his "ward" (that is to say, his mistress) and possibly cast her aside in a decade or so, assuming he isn't too old to care by that point. Of course, she'd be set for life, even if that happened. But by the point in the film where she gives into him, she almost seems past caring about that. She's tried to follow the rules, and society has only penalized her for it. The man who supposedly loves her doesn't trust her, and she's feeling powerfully drawn to David Dwight, who understands her perfectly, and doesn't stand in judgment of anybody--least of all himself. He's a bastard, who destroys people to get what he wants--but he doesn't pretend to be anything else. He doesn't care about respectability or morality. Very few rich men truly do, but most like to at least pretend.This pre-code film has it both ways, regarding the denouement of this particular sub-plot--you can, if you wish, believe that Lynn is saved from the proverbial Fate Worse Than Death, by the not entirely selfless intervention of her friend, Dwight's former mistress. But in truth, a number of days have passed since Lynn gave in to Dwight's advances, she seems awfully comfortable in his embrace, she's wearing clothes he bought for her, and is obviously living in his penthouse. Dwight is not the kind of man who is going to wait until he gets her on the yacht to have his pleasure. He's already gotten what he--and she--wanted. Even in the pre-code era, this is a bit too subversive, which is why the movie deftly clouds the issue of whether they've had sex or not. But there can be no doubt of her eagerness--by this point, she wouldn't leave Dwight for the bank clerk, even if the clerk could offer her everything she asked for. With Dwight gone, she'll marry her bank clerk, and raise a family, and perhaps count herself lucky to have gotten to experience a bit of the high life before settling down. But one wonders if the bank clerk will end up wondering why their first kid doesn't look like him. I'm reading a great deal into this, of course. I really hated the bank clerk, btw. ;-)