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

Invaderbank The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Jemima It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Art Vandelay Like a lot of Hollywood movies in the studio-bound 30s, this is a stagey, screechy talkfest. Sure, for people who didn't live in a city with live theatre, this ed for mature entertainment. But all these decades later it's just a relic of an era of static film-making. There isn't a single interesting visual shot in the entire movie. The plot barely exists. It's just two cranky people crabbing at each other for nearly two hours. Frankly, the whole movie is tiresome. And this from someone who considers Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf one of the greatest films ever made.

richard-1787 This movie was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor (Walter Huston). That's because it's one very impressive movie.Of a different sort.Like the novel, Sinclair Lewis' Dodsworth, this is the story of an older man who has arrived at retirement but discovers that he has no identity other than his work. His wife, a thankless role taken by Ruth Chatterton, can't deal with growing older, and destroys their marriage by flirting with men in an effort to convince herself that she can still for young.But that isn't Dodsworth's issue. After 20 years of being a very successful business executive, he only knows how to define himself in of business deals. When he has no deals to arrange, he has no feeling of accomplishment or self-worth.It takes a major readjustment for him to discover that he can also be someone else, and find fulfillment in something else. It doesn't come easily to him, but he does finally find it.Like Lewis' novel, this is a story particularly suited to American men who are themselves arriving at retirement and will need to find another way of seeing themselves. The novel is even better, but this is one very fine movie. Do something else during the first 50 or so years of your life. But then, as retirement starts to loom, read the book and watch this movie. It will give you something to think about as you start your second life - so that it is, indeed, a life.--------------------------------After another viewing: If you take a great script, have it performed by uniformly first-rate actors under the helm of a first-rate director, you might, if you're lucky, get a film as good as "Dodsworth". You might, if you're lucky. This is really one first-rate movie. If you've never seen it, treat yourself.

mlktrout I've probably seen "Dodsworth" 25 times in the last 35 years, and it never has grown old. There's not a missed mark or a bad performance in the whole film. As a character study of a man whose comfortable, happy retirement has suddenly become a nightmare, it's a jaw-dropper.I won't waste time summarizing the action since others have done so and quite competently. I will observe that Fran Dodsworth's "flings" (played by David Niven, Paul Lukas, and Gregory Gaye) are in various degrees of seriousness with varying degrees of slimy characters. Fran is a silly woman, carried away with pretentious notions of what is and isn't "cultured," and accepts no responsibility for her own actions. It is amazing that she and Sam had such a lasting marriage, unless she had simply never had the opportunity to become such a social butterfly before. Ruth Chatterton's portrayal of her as a status-seeking woman, vain about her looks and terrified of growing older, is dead-on.Walter Huston was a brilliant actor; I've never seen him in a bad performance. It's a shame he is largely forgotten today by the younger crowd who cut their teeth on action flicks and can't comprehend that black and white movies are just as good as (and often better than) their full-color counterparts. Huston played the Dodsworth role on stage and radio as well as film, and in the movie he brings to life the simple yet multi-layered Sam Dodsworth, who could give Job lessons in patience.And what can one say about Mary Astor? I've seen her as vamps and mothers and she's always good. Here she is no vamp or mother, but a woman on her own, alone but not necessarily lonely. She is independent, quietly confident, and she open's Sam's eyes, not only to the fact that there is life after a crushing blow, but to the folly of hanging on to something that will only kill you in the end.When Sam Dodsworth utters his final line in the movie, I have always cheered. Many lines have been written about love, but his well-delivered Parthian shot covers worlds that are to this day unexplored.

Robert J. Maxwell In the opening scene, retiring tycoon Walter Huston bids farewell to his staff and leaves for home, taking a lingering last sentimental glance at his automobile factory and the choking effluential plumes of flue gas spewing out carbon monoxide and other contaminants and I thought, uh-oh, a gloomy story of a man dealing with role loss. As in, "I no longer work, so what do I do NOW, Ma?" Wrong, though. Huston is tickled pink to have time enough at last to do all the things he's been putting off, beginning with a trip to the capitals of Europe. He's happy as a clam on the Queen Mary. It's his wife, Ruth Chatterton, that's having the problem.It's not having a retired man lying around the house all the time either. That's Problem Number Two. She's suffering from Problem Number One. If my husband is now retired, that must mean I'm growing old.Her spirits are buoyed on the Continent though because she attracts the attention of a number of younger men, beginning with the debonair David Niven and extending in time to the suave, hand-kissing Paul Lukas, showering every woman with his pheromones the way Dodsworth's factories bathe their surroundings is particulate waste.Huston notices all this going on and when he's ready to return to his Midwest mansion, Chatterton wants to stay on for a while in Europe. She stays on for a while. Huston sullenly returns home to find his son-in-law and daughter have taken over the place, moving things around in his den, using his cigar humidor to plant bulbs in, and whatnot.So he returns to Europe where he finds his wife and Lukas sharing a vacation in Biarritz. A bit of friction, there, exalted in magnitude when Chatterton learns that she is now, gasp, a grandmother! Man, is she having a tough time accepting time. Huston meets Mary Astor and there is an electric arc. Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds.So far I guess I've made it sound as if Huston is the good guy and Chatterton the mephitic slut but that would be the wrong impression. It's an adult movie. Huston's character may be a bit too much the man of principle, but Chatterton's character has a touch of pathos. She's considerably younger than Huston and isn't ready for the kind of role discontinuity that's being forced on her. Huston has gotten his kicks out of Europe and he wants to settle down and breathe the cold contaminated air of his home town. But what has she got to look forward to? Stretch marks, cellulite, Botox, and a man who shortly will show as much sexual interest in her as in a manatee. It's not a simple-minded flick. Even Lukas, whose role is that of the seducer, is given his due. She invites him into her flat while her husband sleeps in another room and he hesitates because he believes it to be wrong, though he confesses his love for her.But neither does much happen outside these family dynamics and rather routine romantic flings. I found the acting stiff. I like Walter Huston but in these kinds of films he's kind of hard to take seriously -- those sly, knowing, sideways glances; the stern and business-like tone of voice that varies so little. Chatterton's performance is professional but no more than that.I'd like to give it a better recommendation because it has ambition and reach, but it's a little dull and talky for me. Others might enjoy it more.