This movie deserves a broader audience, for its originality and its superior value as entertainment. Written with great care and sensitivity, it chronicles the growing estrangement between a long-married American couple, who embark on a European tour as a sort of reward for their success and an attempt to begin life anew. This plan goes unpredictably awry, as husband and wife find in the Old World very different lives awaiting them. Walter Huston gives a tremendous performance as the industrialist everyman whose affability and boyish enthusiasm seem to know no bounds. He is grumpy and honest and amusing, and yet his character comes across as a very real human being. It's a very endearing performance, with moments of depth, sensitivity and darkness not found much anywhere, in any film drama. Ruth Chatterton is remarkable as well. She turns the thankless role of the shallow and vain aging wife into a tour de force. Her flirtatiousness has a tinge of desperation, and her social pretensions are both funny and pathetic. This is a complex role, as difficult in its way as Hustons, and Chatterton brings a remarkable force to it. She may be crass and unforgivable, but she's unforgettable, as well. This is one of most complete successes of William Wyler's career, and also that rarest of Hollywood specimens: a film for grownups. Not to be missed.
Review of Dodsworth
