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Just perfect...

Captivating movie !

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Enjoyable adventure is filmed at a lively clip and delivers a fine entertainment. A bit heavy on the ham in a couple of places but entertaining nonetheless. Edward G.Robinson is fine as always although he should have rethought the earring. He is full of brio and shows his versatility but his costume does him no favors. He and Miriam are a fine pair even though he despised her offscreen. A good actress if a bit dithery she managed to destroy her starring career with cheap tricks and constant attempts to upstage her co-stars. The story goes that Edward G. became fed up with it and when the script called for him to strike her he was so frustrated with her shenanigans that he didn't pull the slap and sent her flying to the applause of the assembled crew.

I'd never seen it, never really heard of it until I saw it offered for next-to-nothing and bought it on the strength of a Hecht-MacArthur screenplay, direction by Howard Hawks and a cast headed by Eddy Robinsion and Miriam Hopkins - not the most natural teaming. To say I was bitterly disappointed is to say that 9/11 was unfortunate. I was unable to identify one single frame that said 'Howard Hawks' and even more incredible it seems that Hawks took over from Willy Wyler. There's not a scintilla of originality in the story and even less chemistry between Robinson and Hopkins or Hopkins and Joel McCrea, who provides the third facet of the eternal triangle. Frankly I'm sorry I bothered.

Somewhat run-of-the-mill period piece combining characters and story points probably seen to better effect elsewhere. I could accept E. G. Robinson in his role as a swaggering casino owner in his puffy shirt and earring (and severe sidechops), and he leavens his evildoing with a little bit of pathos in his yearning for a woman who will love him for himself. Poor sap hasn't learned that having people shot in the back is a poor way to impress a woman. Miriam Hopkins does a fine job, mostly, but she sometimes uses her eyebrows to punctuate her dialog a little too much. Hawks should have told her to tone down the brow action a little. The opening sequence as the ship pulls into a fog-enshrouded San Francisco Bay is beautifully shot.

Apparently Sam Goldwyn picked the words Barbary Coast as a title then called in his writers and told them to write a story. That was the way they did things at Hollywood studios in the thirties.This is actually a pretty entertaining movie that catches some of the anything goes atmosphere of San Francisco in gold rush days.Edward G. Robinson is miscast (and has to wear some peculiar costumes) in his role as a bad guy but he gives it everything he's got and some of his scenes are quite effective. Miriam Hopkins is very good as a gold digger of the non mining kind and Joel Mcrea as her hearts desire spouts some poetic dialogue quite eloquently.Good drama of the typically Hollywood kind.