Ah Wilderness! (1935) – full review!
Ah Wilderness! (1935) – full review!
Co-produced & directed by Clarence Brown with a screenplay by married couple Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett (The Thin Man (1934)) based on Eugene O’Neill’s play this above average comedy drama about family life just after the turn of the 20th century features a terrific cast that includes Wallace Beery Lionel Barrymore Aline MacMahon Eric Linden Cecilia Parker Spring Byington Mickey Rooney Charley Grapewin Frank Albertson Edward Nugent and Bonita Granville (among others). James Donlan Tom Dugan Eily Malyon and Jed Prouty (among others) also appear uncredited. Barrymore is the patriarch of the family he runs the newspaper in small town America 1906; Byington is his wife. Beery plays Byington’s live-in brother who can’t find a steady job per his drinking MacMahon plays the family’s cook (?) who maintains an "on again off again" relationship with him. Albertson plays the oldest college aged son whose pal is played by Nugent. Rooney plays the youngest son who’s younger than Mickey’s 14 years Granville is the only daughter. Linden plays the middle son who’s just graduated from high school along with his girlfriend Parker; Grapewin plays Parker’s father. It’s a coming of age story primarily focused on Linden’s character whose views on life are more liberal than those of his conservative family and in their community.
Richard Miller (Linden) reads books that were considered racy scandalous or even subversive at the time: Oscar Wilde George Bernard Shaw Swinburne’s poetry and political tomes about the oppressed working man. This makes him somewhat out of place in the idyllic community in which he lives where his father Nat (Barrymore) runs the local paper. Richard’s mother Essie (Byington) has asked Nat to take their son’s subversive reading materials away from him. Regardless Richard is the valedictorian of his class and he’s told his girlfriend Muriel McComber that he’s going to use his high school graduation speech to expose the capitalist ways he deems are wrong. Fortunately for Richard Nat is on stage to hand out the diplomas and after reading his son’s speech beforehand interrupts his son just in time to keep him from making a fool of himself and upsetting virtually everyone else there. Richard’s odd ways have already alienated Muriel’s father (Grapewin) who forces his daughter to write a "Dear John" letter to her boyfriend after he reads the corruptive poems Richard had written her. He also cancels his ad in Nat’s paper which means a considerable financial loss for the Millers.
Nat’s ne’er do well brother Sid (Beery) who had left their town where everyone already knows him (e.g. his drinking & reputation) to take a job in another town returns in time for the town’s annual Fourth of July celebration. Tommy (Rooney) and the rest of the town’s preteen boys have been setting off firecrackers all day. Sid keeps the fact that he’s lost his job for presumably the same reasons a secret by hiding his luggage in the front bushes at least temporarily. He enters the Miller home to charm Lily Davis (MacMahon) who’d promise to finally marry him if he’d sober up and hold a respectable job. But after an evening of celebrating with Nat Sid returns drunk on beer to join the Millers for dinner. Malyon plays the Miller’s maid Nora. Nat says that Sid will be staying that he’s offered his brother a job on his paper. Unfortunately Granville playing the Miller’s only daughter Mildred isn’t given much to do in this film besides laugh at Sid’s drunkenness or rib her brothers especially Richard.
After receiving Muriel’s letter Richard accepts Wint’s invitation to go out on the town with him and a couple of ‘fast’ girls. Wint (Nugent) had come by to go out with Richard’s older brother Art (Albertson) but Art had another date playing tennis instead. Richard then finds himself in a hotel bar with a much older floozie named Belle (Helen Flint) who with the help of the bartender (Dugan) and encouragement from another patron (Donlan) gets him drunk and "extorts" some money from him. Richard returns home drunk much to Mildred’s delight and their parents dismay. Later Belle gives a note describing her evening with Richard to Nat’s office mate (Prouty) which leads to father & son conversation about "the birds and the bees" after Richard had insisted that nothing had happened the woman. Belle’s motivation had been to get the bar’s license revoked for serving a minor after she had been unceremoniously thrown out of the place. In the end Richard makes up with Muriel whose father has decided (for some reason) that he’s not such a bad kid after all.