Possessed (1931)
This is a great pre-code melodrama about a poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks trying to make it big. Marian Martin (Joan Crawford) sees how the other half lives from window scenes in a passing railroad car, and resigns to getting some of that, by any means possible.
She moves to the big city and becomes the mistress to a successful lawyer, Mark Whitney (Clark Gable). She falls for the dog, but Mark isn't the marrying kind. On top of that, Marian is still not really accepted by rich society anyway. It gets a little preachy, but generally a good movie.
This is one of Crawford's best with her showing off her complete range of strong, vulnerable, nice, and bitchy. Gable is his trademarked strong self as far as male romantic leads go, who have previously, traditionally been, well, kind of feminine. Gable's Mark character is a man's man and yet could be romantic, when called for, which made him a favorite with both women and men. Crawford saw this in Clark Gable early on and had him star in a lot of her movies.
I think that Possessed was later remade in 1947 with Joan Crawford doing Van Heflin.
This is a great pre-code melodrama about a poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks trying to make it big. Marian Martin (Joan Crawford) sees how the other half lives from window scenes in a passing railroad car, and resigns to getting some of that, by any means possible.
She moves to the big city and becomes the mistress to a successful lawyer, Mark Whitney (Clark Gable). She falls for the dog, but Mark isn't the marrying kind. On top of that, Marian is still not really accepted by rich society anyway. It gets a little preachy, but generally a good movie.
This is one of Crawford's best with her showing off her complete range of strong, vulnerable, nice, and bitchy. Gable is his trademarked strong self as far as male romantic leads go, who have previously, traditionally been, well, kind of feminine. Gable's Mark character is a man's man and yet could be romantic, when called for, which made him a favorite with both women and men. Crawford saw this in Clark Gable early on and had him star in a lot of her movies.
I think that Possessed was later remade in 1947 with Joan Crawford doing Van Heflin.