“A
beautiful young woman with two
men vying for her hand falls in love with
a conman who takes her for a ride after
persuading her to rope in her father
and his friends to finance a fictitious
development in the small town where
they live in the charming classic 1931
movie Bad Sister...”
LIVING HAPPILY IN A SMALL TOWN during the 1930s, the Madisons have some
standing as father John (Charles Winninger) owns a small business and has a
supportive wife (Emma Dunn).
Eldest daughter Amy (Helene Chadwick) is married to plumber Sam ("Slim" Summerville)
and is heavily pregnant with their first child and the indulged Marianne (Sidney
Fox: Midnight) has attracted the attention of two respectable gentlemen.
Wade Trumbull (Bert Roach), has a successful insurance business, and Richard
"Dick" Lindley (Conrad Nagel: All That Heaven Allows) is a dedicated
doctor. However, youngest daughter Laura (Bette Davis: Whatever Happened to
Baby Jane?) is in love with Dick and is upset by her sister's flirting.
“Bad
Sister
is a beautifully romantic
family saga
with a sparkling cast
and a delightful smattering of comedy
amid tragedy and
disappointment.
A true classic...”
Their
young brother Hedrick (superbly played by David Durand) is a meddlesome, astute
and cheeky chappie; not really meaning any harm in the things he does but having
a strong sense of what's right. The family has daily help in the shape of the
"moaning" Minnie (ZaSu Pitts), for whom everything is too much trouble.
Marianne strings both Wade and Richard along; but while she is out at the cinema
with Dick, whom she berates for lending his car to his younger brother to use
so that they have to use the bus, she meets the suave and sophisticated Valentine
Corliss (Humphrey Bogart: Casablanca), complete with car(!), who sweeps
her off her feet and she leaves Dick to take the bus home alone.
Val regales Marianne with tales of his business expertise and she invites him
to dinner with her family, but she is aghast to find that Amy's husband Sam
has been made redundant and they are to move back in with the family, which
is to suffer a terrible tragedy.
Marianne persuades her father and his friends to look at investing in Val's
supposed new venture in the town, but before he has had a chance to look at
it he is ill and his friends, believing wrongly that he has sanctioned the deal,
go ahead without him.
Hookwinked by Val that he is going to marry her, Marianne goes away with him;
but he shows his true colours and abandons her in a sleazy hotel. Devastated,
she has no alternative other than to go home to face her family. Her father
is equally distraught as he has discovered just how deceitful she has been.
The family face tragedy, hardship and possible ruin. Can they recover the good
standing they had in the community? Has Marianne gone a step too far? Bad
Sister is a beautifully romantic family saga with a sparkling cast and a
delightful smattering of comedy amid tragedy and disappointment. Hollywood icon
and two-time Oscar-winner Bette Davis shines in her first-ever film role. A
true classic that stands up well today.
Bad Sister also features: Dick Winslow as the Paperboy; and Sammy Blum
as Dave.
Music Department: David Broekman (Composer & stock music); Cinematographer is
Karl Freud; Adaptation and Screenplay: Edwin Knopf, Tom Reed and Raymond L Schrock
from the novel The Flirt by Booth Tarkington; Produced by Carl Laemmle
Jr; and Directed by Hobart Henley.
*Bad
Sister is released on DVD in the UK, courtesy of Simply Media, on 18 April
2016. Running Time: 65 Minutes Approximately | Catalogue Number: 164449 | RRP:
£12.99.
"Bad Sister is a beautifully romantic family saga with a sparkling cast
and a delightful smattering of comedy amid tragedy and disappointment. A true
classic" ~ Maggie Woods
“A
beautiful young woman with two 