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Wonderful character development!

Simply A Masterpiece

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

This Pre-Code Film takes More Risks than just the Risqué Underwear Shots and Double Meaning Dialog. After the First Half Establishing the Medical Template and Barbara Stanwyck's Title Character with Scenes Among Horny Interns and Medical Procedures, the Movie Explodes into Lurid Exploitations of Alcohol Abuse, Drug Sniffing Doctors with Nose Twitches, and a Plot to Starve Children to Death to Collect Trust Funds.There is Crackling Dialog about Ethics, and Stanwyck Standing Up to a Brutish Villain, Played by Clark Gable, who Punches and Slaps Around Anyone Within Arm's Reach. The Drunks here are So Inebriated They can Barely Stand Up or Speak Clearly and Spend a lot of Time Weaving Around and Falling on the Floor.Especially the Mother of the Victimized Children Drowning Her Guilt and Blaming it on the Booze. "I'm a Dipsomaniac and proud of it". She Slurs. Stanwyck says..."You Mother..." and then Pauses. Even in the Pre-Code Films the F-Word was Forbidden in Hollywood.This Touching, Grim, and Stunning Look at the Dark Side of Humanity is a Must See for Fans of Pre-Code Movies, Stanwyck, Gable, and the Always Bubbly Joan Blondell. It is Typical Warner Bros. Social Concern, Director William Wellman Crafts an Example how Nastiness and Evil could be Shown Before the Code in an Entertaining and Enlightening way with Two-Dimensional Characters like the "Hero" Bootlegger, without Pussy Footing Around. It Deals with the Thug in this Story in a Realistic and Finalized Way, that would be Impossible in Postcode Cinema.

Tough young nurse Lora (Barbara Stanwyck) is assigned as personal nurse to two children. She comes to believe they are in danger from their alcoholic mother and her brutish chauffeur Nick (Clark Gable) . When she gets no help from her superiors, she turns to Mortie (Ben Lyon), a bootlegger she treated for a gunshot wound. Wonderful Pre-Coder from director William Wellman. Stanwyck is very good in an early role. Clark Gable makes a great heavy. Sassy Joan Blondell is lots of fun. Charles Winninger, Vera Lewis, and Ralf Harolde offer fine support. Ben Lyon, largely forgotten today, does remarkably well here with actors who would go on to become screen legends. Don't miss those scenes of Stanwyck & Blondell undressing. Scenes like that are what Pre-Code film lovers live for.

This is a Pre-Code movie where bootlegging gangster Mortie (Ben Lyon), is actually more ethical than anyone in the entire movie, except of course, Lora Hart (Barbara Stanwyck). Spoilers ahead: You see that when Lora is trying to save two little girls from being poisoned to death, the only one who really helps her is Mortie, who knows what she is about by taking a bullet out of him, and not reporting the shooting to the police (at risk of her job). However, this movie is a must see to see Clark Gable (Nick the chauffeur), playing the most evil role of his career. There are others where he is a bad guy ("Manhattan Melodrama", "A Free Soul" & "The Painted Desert" come to mind (he was not too nice in "San Francisco" or "Sporting Blood" either), but NOWHERE was he outright sinister, like in this movie, and I liked the fact that he got knocked off. Gable is the main reason to see this movie, but Stanwyck is not far behind. There is one scene, where Nick punches out Lora, and later on, you see a bandage on her chin. It makes you think that yes, it was Barbara not a stunt double that took the punch from Gable, that is how tough Stamwyck was. The ending is quite interesting because of why Lora & Mortie ended up together: They knew the other was strong enough to do so.

A tawdry and downright disturbing pre-code film that stars Barbara Stanwyck giving one hell of a ferocious performance.Stanwyck plays the titular night nurse, assigned to care for the two small children of a negligent and drunken floozy. The children's' father is dead; the family chauffeur, played by a hateful Clark Gable, is running things, and he wants the children to die so that he can collect the trust money that was intended for them. Therefore, the children are wasting away from starvation while a useless maid dithers around and Stanwyck tries to get the hospital to intervene.The film would probably be instantly forgettable if not for the fierce performance of Stanwyck, who throws herself (quite literally) into the role of savior, taking punches, getting thrown into a wall, all while dishing out some punches of her own. This is film-making of the sensational Warners variety, featuring lots of suggestive dialogue, shots of Stanwyck and her nurse buddy, the saucy Joan Blondell, in their underwear, and a world in which things like murder are o.k. as long as they're done for the right reason. The movie is certainly no masterpiece, but it does have that energy and sizzle that characterized Warners films from this time period, and it is effective on its own modest terms.Grade: B+