Review of The Sin of Madelon Claudet

Helen Hayes' sound film debut is an acting tour de force, and she deserved her Oscar. She plays the title character, Madelon Claudet, a woman with such terrible bad luck and so much trouble it belies her innocence. First, she's abandoned by her lover when she is pregnant, and gives birth to a son she then hoped would be dead. Her scene where she rejects the baby at first is heart-wrenching. Then, in quick succession, she goes to jail for a crime she didn't commit, and when she gets out, arranges for her son, who now thinks his mother is dead, to go to medical school through kindly Jean Hersholt. But she turns to prostitution and thievery to pay for it. It's the old story of a self-sacrificing mother going through hell for her son, just as in Stella Dallas and many other early "women's pictures." In the end, she meets her son (Robert Young) who is now a doctor and you root for him to finally know who she really is.