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Excellent but underrated film

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

All we reviewers seem to agree that John Garfield shines as an antihero/nonconformist in his breakthrough role. And it is a good film.... however! Musically, Sinatra at piano and singing, throughout the film YOUNG AT HEART not just in the first scenes, works better than Garfield not shown AT ALL musically, after the first third of the film. There is also a better musical AND romantic connection in YOUNG AT HEART, between Sinatra and Doris Day, than there is between Garfield and Lane in FOUR DAUGHTERS. Watch them back to back and see what I mean. The scenes in Micky and Ann's (Garfield and Lane's) apartment and in the restaurant they visit right afterward, don't suggest much love or chemistry between them. There is no touching at all. Garfield even makes a crack about how he might split on her for a touring job, if he had the money to do it. She replies calmly that she wouldn't be surprised, or something like that. Not romantic! I think there is more love depicted in the same scenes with Sinatra and Day. And then there is the issue of Mickey Borden being apparently unemployable. What? He was good enough for Felix (Jeffrey Lynn character) to hire him to orchestrate a piece for which Felix won a prize. Yet he cannot get a job even playing piano in New York City? And he's referred to as not really talented, later in the film. That does not compute for me. He wouldn't have been hired! Now, I think one could make the case that FOUR DAUGHTERS has the stronger ending.....with Mickey dying and freeing up Ann to marry Felix, who is obviously still in love with her even though he was jilted at the altar. Sinatra had that much clout that he could force a sappy, happy ending to Young At Heart, happy for HIS character! But other than that, I think that YOUNG AT HEART is better in some ways. Doris Day turning to Barney (Sinatra) and LOVING him, while still not over the Felix character (now called Alex and played by the always attractive and endearing Gig Young), is more believable in this version. It is also better to set the Garfield/Sinatra character up as quite talented, which is only successfully done in YOUNG AT HEART. That makes his pessimism, malaise and frustration more interesting and poignant. Both May Robson and Ethel Barrymore are superb in their roles as the aunt.

This was John Garfield's introduction to the public and along with Doris Day in Romance on the High Seas and Katharine Hepburn in A Bill of Divorcement one of those instances where in just one role an unknown makes the leap to full fledged star by sheer force of personality and talent. The film itself is an enjoyable enough comedy/drama of four sisters and their various travails but is faulted by the miscasting of the male lead. All four of the women are supposedly swept away by love for Jeffrey Lynn's character Felix. The problem being that while he is very handsome he is beyond bland making the attraction of all four a puzzler. This is especially true as soon as Garfield's Mickey shows up loaded with bruised charisma to burn and pulling the focus of the story to him without even trying. Even though he and Priscilla Lane, in the first of several pairings, are supposed to be mismatched they make far more sense together than she and Felix. That bit of miscasting aside the film does offer two very fine actors, Claude Rains and May Robson, as the heads of the family, they inject a great deal of pleasure into their scenes. As far as the sisters go it's easy to see why Priscilla had the biggest career. She has a certain quality that the others are missing although they aren't bad just unexceptional. Lola is a bit out of place, she was always better when playing a hard luck dame. Her look was more suited to those parts. Of course Gale Page wasn't really one of their real life sisters but favors them enough to be believable but both she and Rosemary don't really stand out. Good of its type but without Garfield in the cast this would be forgotten.

It's not hard to see why this powerful introduction to the public of one of the iconic film stars was so sensational. Not unlike Brando in Streetcar, except that the material is quite sentimental and makes Garfield's performance seem even that much edgier and magnetic. Not that this is a Life With Father With Angry Young Man, the script is intelligent and the conflicts believable. Priscilla Lane is wonderfully naturalistic as the youngest daughter with 2 men in love with her, including Garfield's Mickey Borden. And as always, Claude Rains' performance as the widower father and May Robson's as the live-in Aunt Etta, are fine and provide a lot of humor. The movie does have both a light and a heavy touch, intermingled deftly. Probably deserving of the Oscar nominations it received for 1938, but not of two sequels...

Lovingly crafted and terribly interesting to watch Garfield's gritty, breakthrough performance (introducing a new kind of rebellious acting style that would carry over to the Brandos and Clifts and so on after the war) but all that sisterly affection is a bit suffocating. Priscilla Lane is a bright, engaging performer but the other sisters don't really register (though they're all allowed to be tart and witty) and I just had a hard time buying any of the other male characters besides Garfield. Jeffrey Lynn is a pleasant enough actor, but he lacks the movie star weight to match up with Garfield's hard luck Mickey Borden and that throws the film a bit out of whack. (Imagine a Jimmy Stewart or someone in the part.) Also, I was not convinced that Garfield would make the pivotal (to say the least) final decision that he made. The film needed another half hour of running time to better explain that action; it feels awfully rushed and under-motivated.Still, it's not hard to understand how anybody who grew up with this picture would remember it fondly. It falls short of being a classic, but it does contain a few classic moments. The two gate swinging scenes are pure movie magic.