FeistyUpper If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Martin Bradley This was the film that basically launched Bette Davis' career. Many people still believe the Oscar she won as Best Actress for 1935's "Dangerous" was in recompense for losing out here. She wasn't actually nominated by the Academy but was put into contention by a write-in ballot. She's Mildred, the slatternly waitress at the centre of W Somerset Maugham's "Of Human Bondage" who makes life miserable for the men who come into contact with her, and in particular for Philip, the young medic who worships her, (Leslie Howard, very good).The problem is that Mildred is meant to be a Cockney and Bette was simply unable to put across the accent, though to be fair she does make a fair stab at a Cockney trying to sound posh. She certainly remains one of the least sympathetic characters in all of fiction and you can see how Davis' performance cemented her 'there's-no-one-better-than-Bette-when-she's-bad' reputation and leaving the accent aside she really is very good.Indeed, of the three versions of the novel to be filmed this is still the best though none of them do the original justice, (I've never understood why a fine British actress has never been cast in the part). The director, John Cromwell, handles it well enough but he gallops through the plot in under ninety minutes; you feel like you're watching it in shorthand. In a good supporting cast it's Kay Johnson's Nora who almost steals the film from under the noses of the leads but it's too small a part to make that much of an impression. Despite its inadequacies the film itself stands up reasonably well today which only goes to show just how good the source material actually is. Over 80 years later this is still worth seeing.

Tweekums Philip Carey was an aspiring artist in Paris but it was clear that that profession was going nowhere so he returns to his native London where he starts training as a doctor. He soon falls for Mildred, a waitress who clearly isn't really interested in him. They go out on a few dates but soon she tells him that she is marrying another man. He starts getting on with his life and seeing another woman but when Mildred turns up, pregnant and claiming her husband left her Phillip starts looking after her. She doesn't treat him any better and is soon mocking him and flirting with his friends. Eventually it appears that he is over her and seeing the daughter of a friend… of course Mildred turns up like a bad penny and but this time he won't let her ruin his life; he'll help her but he won't love her; something that infuriates her.This film is over eighty years old but it is still a difficult watch at times; not because it isn't a good story but because it is painful watching poor Phillip ruining his life pursuing a woman who holds him in contempt. The protagonists are interesting; a nice man self-conscious about his club foot and a thoroughly unpleasant woman. Leslie Howard does a fine job as the sympathetic Phillip but it is Bette Davis who dominates as Mildred, a character it is impossible to like with her barely concealed contempt for the man who keeps helping her. The supporting cast do a fine job. The ending is as one might expect for a film of the time but that isn't a problem. Overall I'd recommend this to fans of classic films but can't really say I enjoyed it as it is so hard to watch at times.

skinner-c This movie is as fascinating as it is timeless. The movie itself motivated me to buy and read W. Somerset Maugham's novel from beginning to end.Both this 1934 original and the 1946 remake with Eleanor Parker are treasures, and while the remake was essentially a reproduction of the earlier version, that makes it no less intriguing for me.While this original (and the 1946 remake) primarily encapsulate Philip's eventful and traumatic encounter with Mildred Rogers, this episode only comprises about 40 percent of the pages of Maugham's 1915 masterpiece. The episode, however, effects Philip to the very end.The screenplay was adopted from the book with some modifications for a happier ending, while being very faithful to the essence of Maugham's dynamic characters, taking many of Mildred's cockney'd lines ("I don't mind") verbatim. In the movie versions Philip's clubfoot is healed through surgery, but in Maugham's novel he seems to bear the handicap to the end, although an operation to correct it was attempted without apparent success.You can't leave this movie (or the book) unchanged, and I am grateful to have experienced it. As for Mildred, we have in life met her, all of us. And perhaps - in one way or another - we are all Philip.

calvinnme After four years of bad sistering and parachute jumping at Universal and Warner Brothers respectively, Bette Davis gets her big chance at tiny RKO playing a completely amoral young woman who thinks she is the taker, using her looks to get what she wants, but ultimately winds up in the gutter because she is the taken not the taker after all, and always has been.Bette Davis allows herself to go from beautiful to disheveled impoverished tuberculosis victim in this film. She is a vision in the first part of the film with those saucer eyes looking over the rim of a champagne glass, a scarecrow at the end. If you have ever read about Miss Davis' upbringing, she was brought up New England puritan all the way. So to play a cockney waitress who is the definition of trollop is pure great acting on her part as well as bravery.Leslie Howard plays the club footed medical student Philip Carey who is a medical student only because he couldn't hack it as an artist. But he is not one to feel sorry for himself. As life time and again knocks him down, he just gets back up and does the best that he can, one step at a time. His weakness is Mildred (Bette Davis) an uneducated cockney waitress whose only asset is beauty. She goes out with him but does not return his devotion, and time after time he picks her up when nobody else will when she falls. And time and again she uses him, takes what she can get, and then leaves him in the lurch for another man. This behavior over time turns Philip's love to disgust. Lesson number one - don't tell a woman who you are letting sleep on your couch and who has a key to your flat that you find her disgusting. Especially when she always gives in to the most vindictive and base instincts possible of a human being.Reginald Owen gives a great performance of a loud loquacious charity ward patient who practically adopts Philip as his son and gives Philip a welcome taste of family. Frances Dee plays Owen's beautiful daughter, who is everything Mildred is not. But somehow it takes years for Carey to think of her romantically. This is never explained, maybe because there is no time in this 80 minute movie to squeeze an entire novel.I'd highly recommend this one. It has everything - great acting, gritty realism, and an unusual story line, all from a low budget studio. And after all of this what did the eventual Queen of Warner's go back to at WB? A role in the mediocre "Housewife" where she isn't given much more to do than wander around looking fabulous in what seems to be a copy of Kay Francis' wardrobe. Grrr . Arrgh.