I've given this little movie (and I emphasize the word "little") a generous 3/10, mainly because the lovely Mary Astor is in it. She does not have the largest part, unfortunately. It's the rather dull and not particularly charismatic Kenneth MacKenna who has the major role. MacKenna had wisely switched from acting to directing at this stage of his career, so why he accepted the lead role in this little "B" is a mystery. The script is nothing special. It's one of those plots where nothing happens except in the hapless and totally unwarranted conclusions of one of the participants. Alas, it's the lovely Mary Astor's character who is so light of brain and so lacking in trust, self-confidence and plain ordinary common sense that she makes an issue of a nothing. Yet up to this point, she has seemed quite sensible. Ineeed, reasonably engaging. No hint of stupidity at all! If the script had painted her as an idiot in the opening scenes, we would have been prepared for her false conclusions. But this isn't the way her character is put across! Not only is the script and Miss Astor at fault here, but director Robert Florey should have made a decision to stick to his initial ploy to play the movie as a comedy. That how he wisely starts, but halfway through, he suddenly switches to soap opera and plays the script's nonsense as dull-as-dishwater drama. And what happened to the editor's shears? Even at 60 minutes, "Those Who Love" would be drearily dull, yawnful slogging. But at 82? 82 minutes? Someone has got to be just plain incompetent! Writer? Producer? Director? Editor? Take your pick! Or maybe all four?
Review of Those We Love
