Jennifer Jones plays a feisty tomboy with a sadistic streak who's in love with young masochistic Charlton Heston and will do anything to have him - or to reject and ruin him at varying times, it seems - in this slight and silly offering from director King Vidor. What Heston's character sees in this nut-job Ruby is any viewer's guess. Jones and Heston aren't bad, and Karl Malden is also a welcome asset to the cast in a supporting role. The ending is interesting amidst a well-photographed swamp background. But overall this is a dressed up and rather tacky melodrama that's much better directed than it probably had any right to be. ** out of ****
Review of Ruby Gentry
