Sadie McKee (Blu-ray Review)
- Review Date: May 12, 2025
- Format: Blu-ray Disc
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Director
Clarence BrownRelease Date(s)
1934 (March 25, 2025)Studio(s)
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Warner Archive Collection)- Film/Program Grade: B+
- Video Grade: A-
- Audio Grade: A-
- Extras Grade: B
Review
As someone not particularly enamored of glossy 1930s MGM romantic melodramas, especially Joan Crawford vehicles, I nevertheless found Sadie McKee (1934) rather good. Clarence Brown’s (Anna Christie, National Velvet, The Yearling) direction is stylistically assured and all of the performances are very good-to-excellent.
Lawyer Michael Alderson (Franchot Tone) returns home to the wealthy estate of his father, reuniting with childhood friend Sadie McKee (Joan Crawford), the daughter of the family cook. That reunion is soured, however, when at a dinner party Alderson condemns no-good Tommy Wallace (Gene Raymond), Sadie’s boyfriend, an aspiring singer-songwriter fired from the Alderson factory. Sadie, pitching in that evening as a maid, lashes out at Alderson and the other dinner guests, fleeing to New York with Tommy, intending to marry him.
But they’re nearly broke and room at a cheap boardinghouse, Tommy abandoning Sadie the very next day, he running off with sultry Vaudeville singer Dolly Merrick (Esther Ralston). Neighbor Opal (Jena Dixon) helps Sadie get a job as a chorine at a nightclub where alcoholic millionaire Jack Brennan (Edward Arnold), drunkenly attracted to Sadie, invites her to his table, boozily declaring his intentions to take her home and marry her. Also present is Brennan’s lawyer—Michael Alderson—he recognizing the embittered Sadie’s determination to marry Brennan for his millions, she still holding a grudge against him for his treatment of Tommy, for whom she still carries a torch.
And, indeed, Sadie marries Brennan, he unfailingly generous and jovial in his perpetually intoxicated state, but the alcoholism clearly life-threatening. The servants, led by butler Phelps (Leo G. Carroll), resent the new Mrs. Brennan, and believe she’s up to no good when she resolves to save her rich husband’s life, whatever the consequences.
Despite its improbable, convoluted, coincidence-driven plot, Sadie McKee is a sturdy, well-oiled production with several surprises. Though hardly the first American film to explore the ravages of alcoholism, at the time drunks in Hollywood films were typically a source of comedy relief: actors like Jack Norton and Arthur Housman built careers around playing such stock characters. Brennan is in early scenes depicted in a similar light, harmless and amusing, but when Sadie cuts off the booze he turns violent; the underrated Edward Arnold excellent in these scenes. It’s not exactly The Lost Weekend, but impressive for its time.
The film is predictably glamorous in the MGM sense with its cavernous sets of the Brennan mansion, but a bit more Warnersesque in Sadie’s hard-luck scenes in the Big City. Particularly interesting is a hospital ward set near the end; behind the row of beds are massive windows through which one can observe pine trees swaying gently as heavy snow falls, symbolizing a peaceful end-of-life plot development. Director Douglas Sirk would stage part of All That Heaven Allows in a similar manner.
Crawford, Tone, and Arnold are all terrific; director Brown uses a lot of intimate close-ups, and the modulations of the performances are consistently spot-on. Also exceptional is Akim Tamiroff, hilarious as an anything-for-money nightclub owner, the joint backed by performers Gene Austin and Candy [Candido] & Coco [Otto Heimel], in a mostly comic musical act. (Candy Candido later was, very briefly, the partner of straight man Bud Abbott after Lou Costello’s death.) The music also includes the introduction of All I Do Is Dream of You, the Nacio Herb Brown/Arthur Freed standard mostly sung by Gene Raymond, later made even more famous when it was reused for Singin’ in the Rain (1952).
Warner Archive’s Region-Free Blu-ray of Sadie McKee presents the film in its original black-and-white, 1.37:1 standard frame in 1080p. The image is strong, possibly derived from the original nitrate camera negative, with excellent blacks and contrast, albeit also with MGM’s favored gauzy focus frequently employed for such female-driven star vehicles. The DTS-HD Master Audio (2.0 mono) is supported by optional English subtitles.
The supplements are interesting. Included are three remastered Warner Bros. cartoons, all from 1934: Why Do I Dream Those Dreams?, Shake Your Powder Puff, and Pop Goes Your Heart, the last one restored in two-color Technicolor, which looks great. Also of special interest is the original theatrical trailer, which prominently features novelist-screenwriter Viña Delma (The Awful Truth) and alternate takes/cut footage from the film, some of it possibly changed with the impending enforcement of the Production Code.
Many once-popular MGM ‘30s titles haven’t aged well at all, but Sadie McKee is a pleasant surprise, with good performances and direction all-around. Recommended.
- Stuart Galbraith IV