It's difficult if not impossible to disagree with those reviews I've read - first page only - which could be seen as a consensus that this is a film celebrating 'old' 'decent' values, the kind that now seem as dead as the Stone Age. Life, of course, is unfair and the fine Viennese actress Mady Christians created two roles in memorable Broadway plays, Watch On The Rhine and I Remember Mama, played them to great acclaim on Broadway and then lost out when they were adapted for the screen and had to watch Bette Davis and Irene Dunne don the mantle that had been stripped from her. Both films turned out fine and both Ms Davis and Ms Dunne did the respective roles proud, nevertheless ... It is not to hard to find comparisons, A Tree Grows In Brooklyn, narrated by a loving daughter, features a cash-strapped family growing up in Brooklyn circa 1911, with a prominent aunt-figure. Meet Me In St Louis set circa 1903 centres on a more affluent family no less warm and human for all their wealth, and for good measure, it boasts both technicolor and a memorable score. I Remember Mama belongs firmly in the same sentence with both and plants Barbara Bel Geddes firmly in San Francisco a good quarter century before she would find herself there again in Vertigo. If pulling wings off flies lights your fire then this will bore you beyond tears but if you value fine writing, directing, acting, and good old fashioned story telling you will revel, nay, wallow in this.
Review of I Remember Mama
