Not Rouben Mamoulian's finest hour even if this fully-fledged Technicolour movie is rather sumptous to look at. In deference to its heroine, Thackeray's 'Vanity Fair' has been rechristened "Becky Sharp" and Mamoulian gallops through Thackeray's epic novel in under ninety minutes. So much has been left out, you might think you're watching something else entirely. It's also very badly cast. Alan Mowbray, of all people, is the 'dashing' Rawdon Crawley, Alison Skipworth is his dowager aunt and if Miriam Hopkins is a coquettish Becky she's closer to being a Manhattan hostess than a Napoleonic one. Had it been shot in black and white it would have been long forgotten by now but it's saved to a degree by Mamoulian's use of colour. Unfortunately, the dialogue sounds like it came from a dime-store novel rather than from one of the great works of English literature. If there's an audience for this movie today, I'd be very surprised.
Review of Becky Sharp
