Shadowman4710
Katherine Hepburn shines in this melodrama about a girl from the wrong side of the tracks looking to get into "society." While it's a bit dated now, Hepburn's performance carries the film and Fred MacMurray is solid as the man who's interested in her. Definitely a must-see for Hepburn fans.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
06/25/23
Full Review
william d
Fans of Katherine Hepburn should like this one. She's very good in it. I just didn't think the story was all that great.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Have you ever picked up what you thought was a glass of water, but when you took a long sip you ended up with a mouthful of Sprite? A surprising feeling, but then you have to figure out if it's pleasant or not. I felt similarly about my experience watching "Alice Adams", George Stevens' 1935 film starring Katherine Hepburn as the title character. Expecting a wily romantic comedy, possibly a precursor to Hepburn's screwball comedies, I instead witnessed a beautiful, touching and sad film about rejection and romance in small-town America.
Alice is the daughter of a bookkeeper who is sick, and therefore temporarily out of work. Even before his unemployment, his job did not provide as much money for his family as many of Alice's contemporaries. This causes Alice to not be accepted in society, and makes it harder to find a boyfriend, though she tries to keep cheerful in front of her family. Unfortunately Mrs. Adams doesn't make things easier, by constantly harping on Mr. Adams to quit his job and be more ambitious. When the Palmers have their annual dance, Alice asks her brother Walter to take her, and there she first sees Arthur Russell MacMurray) a wealthy young man who is practically engaged to Mildred Palmer, probably the richest and most socially prominent young woman in the town. He notices Alice, and after a dance together, finds her a couple of days later and they begin a romance, but it becomes obvious that Alice is not going to be able to put up a façade of wealth and social acceptance for long, as their relationship becomes more serious.
There were so many times that I found myself just aching for Alice during this film. Booth Tarkington is so good at capturing the darker side of small town life without being obvious, that it is understandable that this film could be mistaken for a light romantic comedy, though in reality it was anything but. Alice's low self-esteem, mainly due to society's views on her more than her family's lack of money makes her such a fragile character that she becomes immediately sympathetic, and this is mainly due to Hepburn's performance. This was early in her career, and after seeing many of her later films it is easy to forget just how radiant and luminous she once was. She has always been one of my favorite actresses, but it was generally because of the strength she gave the characters she played throughout the years, not her fragility. "Alice Adams" was an extremely pleasant surprise, and I ended up absolutely loving it.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
02/08/23
Full Review
steve d
Not a whole lot to it and not a whole lot to like.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
03/30/23
Full Review
Barry M
Staggeringly racist, but if you can ignore that it's a good showcase for Kate.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
06/07/20
Full Review
Audience Member
Recently I have watched several early Katharine Hepburn vehicles in Little Women (1933) and The Philadelphia Story (1940) but it was this relatively forgotten gem that I had overlooked. She received her second Academy Award nomination for this film after winning an Academy Award for the dreadful Morning Glory (1933) and she plays a role unlike anything she had played before or would play again as she is an unusually gentle, fragile woman in this film without losing any of the spirit that makes her such a star. She headlined the film and as she appears on screen throughout most of the film she really carries the film so despite the film's considerable flaws her brilliant performance allows it to be a thoroughly enjoyable film.
The poor, lower class Alice Adams, Katharine Hepburn, lives with her bitter, angry mother, Ann Shoemaker, and her invalid father, Fred Stone, who once had hopes of earning enough money to move his family into a higher social class. The point in contention was a glue formula that Mr. Adams helped to create while working for Mr. Lamb, Charles Grapewin, who continues to financially support him despite him not being able to work. Adams attends the dance party of the wealthy Mildred Palmer, Evelyn Venable, where she begins a flirtation with rich but friendly Arthur Russell, Fred MacMurray, who sees through her lies about her background but is attracted to her. She invites him to dinner but ends up embarrassed when her lies are revealed and her gambling brother Walter, Frank Albertson, arrives to announce that he has stolen money from Lamb. Mr. Adams has angered Lamb by opening up his own glue factory and his former employer arrives to threaten him and Mr. Adams must justify his actions by stating that they were taken out to help his daughter.
The most glaring issue with the film is it's treatment of race as all of the African-American characters that appear on screen are depicted in a negative light and the idea that they are lesser than white people is strongly enforced. Walter, who drags down his entire family, is seen to be friends with several African-Americans and all are portrayed as drunken buffoons who are also manipulative and disgusting. His association with them brings shame to the Adams family and our heroine is seen to find the very presence of these ‘colored' people offensive. The only named African-American character is maid Malena, Hattie McDaniel, who serves the Adams family and is depicted as a fool with little self respect who is a source of embarrassment for the family at their dinner. 84 years later this film appears horribly racist but even at the time most of Hollywood had turned against racism and were working to produce films that while not actively supportive of civil rights did not actively attack African-American audiences.
Other issues with the film include the ending as the darker ending found in the Booth Tarkington novel as while Adams reconciles quickly with Russell in the film in the book she loses him due to her behavior but realizes she will have to change her ways if she is to find true happiness. The end of this film feels tacked on and unnecessary as the rest of the film feels relatively realistic and this felt like something out of a June Allyson picture. Hepburn and MacMurray give it their best shot and make their reconciliation more believable than it would have been in the hands of lesser performers but because they are asked to change the way that their characters act so completely it is hard to take them or the film seriously at this point.
All of this does not matter when Hepburn is such a powerful force on screen as she takes on a role that is so different from what we would come to expect of her and excels. The accent is there and some of the mannerisms but gone is the haughtiness that characterizes most of Hepburn's work and she genuinely settles into her role as a girl from the wrong side of the tracks with self esteem issues. Her desperate attempts to have the wealthy recognize her are heartbreaking and Hepburn plays into her strengths as she seems to be saying three different things at once and enunciates every word a little too carefully. She earned her Best Actress nomination and was certainly doing better work than the eventual winner Bette Davis.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/01/23
Full Review
Read all reviews
>
