Barbara Stanwyck always made her portrayals gritty and believable even when working with mediocre material - and believe me some of her films were not out of the top drawer!!!
In this film she plays a sexy (what else) singer in a "naughty night club" (her words). "I've heard all the questions and I know all the answers". She is giving it up at a chance of happiness with a society boy (Hardie Albright) - but he has heard she has been playing house with bootlegger Eddie Fields (Lyle Talbot) and wants out. She starts again, under an assumed name in Montreal, but is found, so she convinces her maid (with the help of $100) to let her go to Dakota as the mail order bride, in place of her maid (Leila Bennett). The maid has used Joan's photo instead of her own!!!
Joan arrives in Ellis Crossing and meets Farmer Jim Gilson (I have never seen George Brent as a farmer before - I like him better as a city slicker). As another reviewer remarked, the most depressing wedding ever!!!What with Jim's sniffle, beating down the jeweller to $3.50 for the wedding band that is too big for Joan anyway and a simple minded wedding witness who is more interested in a dog fight out in the garden. The farm is not much better - let's just say it needs a woman's touch. There is a shivaree - where all the farming families come by to celebrate the wedding - Jim is not impressed. He is still smarting from Joan's slap, when she objected to his "cave man tactics" and she spends the rest of the film trying to make it up to him.
The bank then forecloses on the farm, which is mortgaged to the hilt, but even though he wants to send her back to Montreal Joan has decided that her future is with Jim. When she comes back after helping with a new born baby (Anne Shirley has an uncredited part as a frightened child) she is surprised to see Eddie at the house - he has never stopped looking for her. After the usual misunderstandings, including a realistic fight at the saloon, Joan secures a loan from Eddie (who is really a very nice guy) for the amount owed on the farm. She organises the bank to forward it to Jim (who never finds out who it is really from) and together they set about to sow the wheat. Of course there are villains - Bull McDowall (David Landau) and Spike (Murray Kinnell) have been lusting after Joan from the start but when they realise she is standing by her man they decide to burn their crops.
Not a lot happens in this movie and when it does - the big fight and then the fire in the fields, the film is over so fast. Barbara Stanwyck is, as usual excellent as the night club singer out of her element among the wheat fields in Dakota. Lyle Talbot is good as a "nice guy" boot- legger. George Brent is okay as the shy farmer but he does look better in a dinner suit. He had already made "So Big", again with Stanwyck, which also had a country setting but the studio must have realised that he was more in his element in the big city. The weird thing was at the beginning of the credits when pictures of the actors are shown with their names underneath - George Brent's picture is shown of him in evening clothes - something he didn't wear in the film.
Recommended.
In this film she plays a sexy (what else) singer in a "naughty night club" (her words). "I've heard all the questions and I know all the answers". She is giving it up at a chance of happiness with a society boy (Hardie Albright) - but he has heard she has been playing house with bootlegger Eddie Fields (Lyle Talbot) and wants out. She starts again, under an assumed name in Montreal, but is found, so she convinces her maid (with the help of $100) to let her go to Dakota as the mail order bride, in place of her maid (Leila Bennett). The maid has used Joan's photo instead of her own!!!
Joan arrives in Ellis Crossing and meets Farmer Jim Gilson (I have never seen George Brent as a farmer before - I like him better as a city slicker). As another reviewer remarked, the most depressing wedding ever!!!What with Jim's sniffle, beating down the jeweller to $3.50 for the wedding band that is too big for Joan anyway and a simple minded wedding witness who is more interested in a dog fight out in the garden. The farm is not much better - let's just say it needs a woman's touch. There is a shivaree - where all the farming families come by to celebrate the wedding - Jim is not impressed. He is still smarting from Joan's slap, when she objected to his "cave man tactics" and she spends the rest of the film trying to make it up to him.
The bank then forecloses on the farm, which is mortgaged to the hilt, but even though he wants to send her back to Montreal Joan has decided that her future is with Jim. When she comes back after helping with a new born baby (Anne Shirley has an uncredited part as a frightened child) she is surprised to see Eddie at the house - he has never stopped looking for her. After the usual misunderstandings, including a realistic fight at the saloon, Joan secures a loan from Eddie (who is really a very nice guy) for the amount owed on the farm. She organises the bank to forward it to Jim (who never finds out who it is really from) and together they set about to sow the wheat. Of course there are villains - Bull McDowall (David Landau) and Spike (Murray Kinnell) have been lusting after Joan from the start but when they realise she is standing by her man they decide to burn their crops.
Not a lot happens in this movie and when it does - the big fight and then the fire in the fields, the film is over so fast. Barbara Stanwyck is, as usual excellent as the night club singer out of her element among the wheat fields in Dakota. Lyle Talbot is good as a "nice guy" boot- legger. George Brent is okay as the shy farmer but he does look better in a dinner suit. He had already made "So Big", again with Stanwyck, which also had a country setting but the studio must have realised that he was more in his element in the big city. The weird thing was at the beginning of the credits when pictures of the actors are shown with their names underneath - George Brent's picture is shown of him in evening clothes - something he didn't wear in the film.
Recommended.