Review of The Working Man

. . . embedded within THE WORKING MAN. After all, literary historians long have debated other flash-in-the-pan "one-hit wonders" lady writers who seemingly "come out of nowhere" to suddenly top best-seller lists without paying their dues as journeyman scribblers. (The consensus of expert wordsmith sleuths is that "Truman Capote" actually wrote TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, for instance, and that "Zane Grey" probably dashed off GONE WITH THE WIND on his 400-foot "fishing yacht.") Which brings us to THE WORKING MAN, and its template for 50 SHADES. This beta version of a manipulative mogul stars "Bette Davis"--famous for WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?--as "Jane Grey." Not unlike the matter of the "magnum opus" of the originally self-published business saga attributed to "Ms. James," WORKING MAN revolves around an older "John" showing naïve Jane the ropes, so to speak, in the Modern World of Making Money. Like 50 SHADES, "49 Shades" features tons of sexual innuendo and hints of impending incest (albeit once-removed). However, since WORKING MAN is a Black & White film, there is no "Red Room," and the ecclesiastic censors of the 1930s prevent "49 Shades" from approaching NC-17 territory as closely as does the later adaptation. On the plus side, "49 Shades" teaches viewers a lot more about John's shoe business than 50 SHADES has managed to do regarding Christian's publishing foray (despite having only a tiny fraction of that over-hyped trilogy's running time). The bottom line is that Ms. James only needed throw in a few whips to the plot of THE WORKING MAN to make her plagiarized story one shade darker.