Susan and God (1940)
* 1/2 (out of 4)
Joan Crawford certainly had a couple interesting years at MGM. In 1939 she delivered what many consider to be her best (THE WOMEN) and worst (THE ICE FOLLIES OF 1939) films while in 1940 she delivered two of the strangest religious pictures ever made. STRANGE CARGO was a pretty entertaining movie that also had Clark Gable. This picture co-stars Fredric March but sadly the end result is somewhat of a disaster. Crawford plays Susan, a woman who comes back from a cruise and only has God on her mind. She tries to push the word of God on her friends but they just laugh at her while her alcoholic husband (March) has a few issues of his own. SUSAN AND GOD is an incredibly weird little picture that some might want to check out just to see how weird it actually is. Up to this point I think it's the worst Crawford picture I've seen for a number of reasons. For starters, the film is just so darn boring that I couldn't wait for it to be over. The thing moves so slow and features so many boring characters that the film's 117-minute running time just seems like an eternity. Even worse is the fact that you really don't care or like the Crawford character. Perhaps things would have been different had we met Susan before the cruise and before she started to worship God. Since we meet her after the fact it's just an annoying character. It also doesn't help that Crawford is way too over-the-top in the film. I've read that she's tried to mimic the lady who originally played the part on stage and if so it just didn't work. Even March is pretty forgettable in the film and even worse is that the wasted cast includes Ruth Hussey, Rita Hayworth, John Carroll, Nigel Bruce and Bruce Cabot. SUSAN AND GOD is a bizarre film about religion and I must admit that I really didn't like any of it. It's a hard film to sit through but an easy one to forget.
* 1/2 (out of 4)
Joan Crawford certainly had a couple interesting years at MGM. In 1939 she delivered what many consider to be her best (THE WOMEN) and worst (THE ICE FOLLIES OF 1939) films while in 1940 she delivered two of the strangest religious pictures ever made. STRANGE CARGO was a pretty entertaining movie that also had Clark Gable. This picture co-stars Fredric March but sadly the end result is somewhat of a disaster. Crawford plays Susan, a woman who comes back from a cruise and only has God on her mind. She tries to push the word of God on her friends but they just laugh at her while her alcoholic husband (March) has a few issues of his own. SUSAN AND GOD is an incredibly weird little picture that some might want to check out just to see how weird it actually is. Up to this point I think it's the worst Crawford picture I've seen for a number of reasons. For starters, the film is just so darn boring that I couldn't wait for it to be over. The thing moves so slow and features so many boring characters that the film's 117-minute running time just seems like an eternity. Even worse is the fact that you really don't care or like the Crawford character. Perhaps things would have been different had we met Susan before the cruise and before she started to worship God. Since we meet her after the fact it's just an annoying character. It also doesn't help that Crawford is way too over-the-top in the film. I've read that she's tried to mimic the lady who originally played the part on stage and if so it just didn't work. Even March is pretty forgettable in the film and even worse is that the wasted cast includes Ruth Hussey, Rita Hayworth, John Carroll, Nigel Bruce and Bruce Cabot. SUSAN AND GOD is a bizarre film about religion and I must admit that I really didn't like any of it. It's a hard film to sit through but an easy one to forget.