SunnyHello Nice effects though.

Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Philippa All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Justina The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

bkoganbing The workingman's studio, better known as Warner Brothers, did most of its social commentary films with an urban setting. Which in itself makes The Cabin In The Cotton a very unique product to come out of this studio. It's not a bad film, could have been better in delivering its message with a lighter hand. But what the Brothers Warner did was go back on an old standby.Watching The Cabin In The Cotton this morning put me in mind of a much better film in which Preston Sturges satirized the making of films like these. If you remember in Sullivan's Travels, director John L. Sullivan played by Joel McCrea wants to make films like these, the epic he wants to do is entitled Oh Brother Where Art Thou. But in order to sell it he's advised to make sure it has 'a little sex'.Which brings me to why The Cabin In The Cotton is remembered today at all. It's because of what Bette Davis brings to the film, a little sex. This film was a big milestone in her career as she plays the hedonistic daughter of that old southern planter Berton Churchill who keeps his sharecroppers, black and white, in virtual peonage.The lead Richard Barthelmess plays a bright young sharecropper's son and Churchill takes an interest in him, sending him to school to be educated because he has no son to help run the old plantation. What he does have is one sexpot of a daughter to keep Barthelmess on the side of the rich and privileged instead of finding true love with one of his own class in Dorothy Jordan.Churchill has been systematically exploiting the sharecroppers with high interest and cheating them on price. They in turn have been stealing cotton and selling bits of it on the black market. Henry B. Walthall and Russell Simpson have been leading the quiet peasant's revolt which threatens to get open and nasty. I'd have to say that the ending of the film has a forced and obvious conclusion both romantically and socially, but you'll have to see it for yourselves to find out.The Cabin In The Cotton is a dated, but historically valid film about conditions in the old Confederacy before the New Deal. But the sex that Bette Davis brings to her role is timeless.

kidboots Can it really be Bette Davis - earlier the same year she was a very mousey, nothing special "girl" in "Hell's House". Now blonded, sparkling and vivacious - Bette Davis has sex appeal.Even though it's main claim to fame is sultry Bette Davis and her "legendary" line "I'd like to kiss ya but I just washed ma hair" - this film is much more.It was one of Warner Brother's "social" dramas, focusing on the clashes between the wealthy planters and the sharecroppers (called peckerwoods). Richard Barthelmass plays Marvin Blake, a share cropper's son who aspires to higher things. Dorothy Peterson plays his mother. When his father dies from over work, Norwood, the planter (Berton Churchill) encourages Marvin to stay at school and later on gives him a job looking after the plantation accounts. The honesty and purity of Marvin's personality keep him in limbo. He feels he doesn't belong to any group. He wants his people to accept him but they are suspicious of his involvement with Norwood. Dorothy Jordan, a popular ingénue in the early 30s, plays Betty, the sharecropper girl who always believes in him. He, in turn, feels loyalty for Madge because he thinks she loves him but he is just a plaything for her.Although not as hard hitting as other Warner's social dramas, it improved in the last half - with an impassioned speech by veteran silent actor Henry B. Walthall as an old sharecropper trying to explain to Marvin what they are fighting for. In the court case at the end of the film Marvin gives an emotional speech about the planters and share croppers working together. Clarence Muse makes a few notable appearances as a blind singer.

drednm Interesting film about the plight of planters vs. share croppers in 1930s South. Richard Barthelmess plays a share cropper's son who is good at school and is sponsored by a planter (Berton Churchill). Although the boy becomes a bookkeeper for him he 's caught between the two worlds and the two girls from each side of town: the planter's daughter (Bette Davis) and a share cropper's neighbor (Dorothy Jordan).As the war between the planters and croppers increases, Barthelmess is caught in a moral dilemma. He knows the croppers are stealing cotton and he knows they burned down the local mercantile (owned by the planter) because they think they've destroyed the the records. But Barthelmess has an extra set.The film is a little slow and maybe too old fashioned but the subject matter is interesting and of course the film features Davis' famous line, "I'd like to kiss ya, but I just washed my hair. Bye!" Aside from that the film offers Barthelmess in his last starring role and good performances by Churchill and Henry B. Walthall as a crippled cropper.Also co-stars David Landau, Virginia Hammond, Russell Simpson, Tully Marshall, Dorothy Peterson, Hardie Albright, and Clarence Muse.Worth a look

Karl Ericsson This film was probably made possible through FDR:s "New Deal". It does proclaim a middle road between vulgar capitalism and vulgar communism and so does not take a totally firm side against the owners but it still beats anything made today and what is Reilly a beauty is how well the ideas put forth blend in with the story, which is a sure sign for any masterpiece, which this certainly is. You have to go to Germany and "Kuhle Wampe" to find something similar but that is more like a loosely constructed road-movie compared with this. Truly astonishing stuff. As for Bette Davies and her antics - those are completely secondary and were probably only put there to work as a smokescreen for the producers. Should be shown in every school.