Baby, the Rain Must Fall

Released Jan 15, 1965

1h 40m

Drama

List

60%

5 Reviews

Tomatometer

41%

500+ Ratings

Audience Score

Henry Thomas (Steve McQueen), a singer and guitarist in a rock band, is on parole for a violent crime. Henry's wife, Georgette (Lee Remick), and daughter, Margaret Rose (Kimberly Block), travel to Texas to be with him as he attempts to repair his relationships and put his life back together. Henry's overbearing foster mother, Kate Dawson, doesn't approve of Henry's musical aspirations and uses the terms of his parole to force him to comply with her wishes.

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Elizabeth Sussex

Sight & Sound

There are difficulties about the plot, transitions that baffle in a way that a director as cogent as [Robert] Mulligan could never have intended.

Mar 31, 2020

Full Review

Ben Sachs

Chicago Reader

Foote's metaphors and psychological insights are so clearly delineated that there's little room for spontaneity, though the actors do what they can with the space they're given.

Nov 21, 2013

Full Review

Emanuel Levy

EmanuelLevy.Com

This quiet rural melodrama, based on Horton Foote's stage play, features strong peformances from Steve McQueen, Don Murray and especially Lee Remick, but it is too understated and lacks narrative drive.

Rated: B-

Dec 15, 2010

Full Review

Steve Crum

Dispatch-Tribune Newspapers

Atmospheric Mulligan production with effective McQueen and Remick.

Rated: 3/5

Jun 8, 2006

Full Review

Michael E. Grost

Classic Film and Television

Moving drama about a troubled man.

Jan 24, 2005

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j F

A slow, sad movie, with powerful acting by Remick and McQueen

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

03/12/24

Full Review

nick s

There was a spell in the middle of this movie when I wondered where the plot was going. And there was a bit of adr mismatch here and there. But overall a well paced and compelling drama. Never quite sure where the story was headed. You have to be up for a bit of a slow burn though.

Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

02/20/24

Full Review

wilbur k

I love Lee Remick. Steve McQueen turns in a powerful performance. Cool Hand Luke came out a couple years later. Right now, I'm watching Wild River (1960) with Remick and Montgomery Clift. I think the 60s was a decade of "questioning"; of self-reflection and struggle against conventional forces that seemed to want crush one's humanity. It was also a time of wandering - in that search of self. The theme song, beckoned me as a young man in those days - to wander: Baby the Rain Must Fall with lyrics that went something like - "Where ever my heart leads me, baby I must go". I suppose it's not an easy movie to like - unless it speaks to you.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

Full Review

Audience Member

While the first few films on the Mill Creek Through the Decades: 1960s Collection were light comedy, this one made me sit up and pay attention to its rough drama. Based on the 1954 play The Traveling Lady, which was also written by this movie's director and writer Horton Foote (To Kill a Mockingbird and Tender Mercies). Georgette Thomas (Lee Remick) has brought her six-year-old daughter Margaret Rose to meet her husband Henry Thomas (Steve McQueen). He's never met her and may not even have known that she exists, as all he cares about is being a singer. He's spent. the last few years in jail after stabbing a man and has been working for Kate Dawson, the woman who raised him — and beat him repeatedly — after his parents died. Her abuse has broken him, as the night after her death, he steals her silver, wrecks his car into the cemetery gates and howls into the night as he stabs her grave, all while his wife watches from the shadows. Obviously, Henry is no father. But it takes Georgette the entire film to realize that she has to get her daughter away from him if they ever want to live a peaceful life. Shot on location in Columbus, Texas, this is a dusty and dark exploration of love not being enough.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/06/23

Full Review

delysid d

its a pretty good movie but one of steve's more tough ones to watch

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

05/17/20

Full Review

ashley h

Baby, the Rain Must Fall is an okay film. It is about a trouble-prone country singer and his estranged wife. Steve McQueen and Lee Remick give decent performances. The screenplay is a little slow in places. Robert Mulligan did an alright job directing this movie. I liked this motion picture because of the drama.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

03/31/23

Full Review

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Robert Mulligan

Director

Steve McQueen

Henry Thomas

Lee Remick

Georgette Thomas

Don Murray

Deputy Sheriff Slim

Paul Fix

Judge Ewing

Josephine Hutchinson

Mrs. Ewing

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Synopsis

Henry Thomas (Steve McQueen), a singer and guitarist in a rock band, is on parole for a violent crime. Henry's wife, Georgette (Lee Remick), and daughter, Margaret Rose (Kimberly Block), travel to Texas to be with him as he attempts to repair his relationships and put his life back together. Henry's overbearing foster mother, Kate Dawson, doesn't approve of Henry's musical aspirations and uses the terms of his parole to force him to comply with her wishes.

Director: Robert Mulligan
Screenwriter: Horton Foote
Distributor: Columbia Pictures
Production Co: Columbia
Genre: Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Jan 15, 1965, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Jan 1, 2013
Runtime: 1h 40m

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