The Younger Generation (1929)

Redundant and unnecessary.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

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

A young Frank Capra slips easily into a milieu you wouldn't expect him to have much feel for--the Jewish Lower East Side--in this early talkie, adapted from a Fannie Hurst novel. Hurst wrote soap operas that validated the feelings of the common woman, but here she's more intent on portraying immigrant Jews, a subculture most of America probably knew and thought little about, with dignity and empathy. And the histrionics are effective. Capra always had a way with actors, and he helps Jean Hersholt, as the stuck-in-his-ways paterfamilias, and Lina Basquette, as a feisty but sympathetic daughter, to their best performances. Ricardo Cortez is more of a natural as the son than you think--he was born Jake Krantz. The early-talkie format, with some scenes with dialogue and others with titles and sound effects, is awkward--if we can hear footsteps and doors slamming, why can't we hear dialogue?--and the not-too-happy ending, with the son punished for his acquisitiveness, is a bit of a downer. But it's loaded with atmosphere, and shows Capra learning his trade quickly.

Younger Generation, The (1929)** 1/2 (out of 4)Early Capra melodrama has poor Jewish family taken out of the ghetto by their youngest son (Ricardo Cortez) who strikes it big. He moves his father (Jean Hersholt), mother (Rosa Rosanova) and sister (Lina Basquette) into a large house and expects them to do what he says and stay away from the "filth" they grew up around. Soon the three start to realize that money can't buy happiness but will the son learn this before it's too late? At this point in time Columbia was still a very small studio so they couldn't afford to go all in in terms of sound movies so this is another example of a silent with a few sound segments scattered throughout the film. I've always found this to be incredibly distracting but I think Capra does a great job at when to use the sound and I also think the quality of the recorded words is among the best I've heard from this era. Considering how poor the studio was it's rather shocking that some of the other studios early talkies didn't come off sounding better. With that said, there are some major problems with the film but for the most part it's a nice time filler that fans of the director will want to check out. The biggest problem is that even in 1929 this material was way too predictable. There's really not a single thing that happens in the film that you won't see coming from a mile away. The format pretty much follows every morality film that came before it and I just wish at some point Capra would have shaken things up just to keep us off guard or at least in some drama. It should come as no shock that Capra does a great job with what's here and manages to keep the film moving quite fast and he keeps it as entertaining as the screenplay will allow. The cast also keeps things moving nicely with their fine performances. Cortez would play this type of role countless times in his career and he always managed to do good with it. Hersholt clearly steals the film as the tortured father. In the end, this isn't the greatest film ever made but I think Capra did the most he could considering what he had to work with. I think those who like to search out these early talkies will find the quality here to be above average and will make one wonder why some of the bigger studios didn't have their stuff sounding as good.

I just had the opportunity to see this film on our most valuable classic film resource, TCM. It was good to see, purely for historic purposes regarding Frank Capra's career. One good thing about the silent parts is that if you had taped or Tivo'd the film, you can scan the silent scenes at double speed and still follow the story. One curious thing (stemming from the original story) stood out for me though; if I wanted to change my name from Goldfish to a classier name, I would surely change it to Gold instead of Fish! After all, Samuel Goldfish changed his name to Goldwyn. I say, when in doubt, keep the Gold and lose the Fish!

In this film, we see Morris Goldfish (Ricardo Cortez) bring success to his Jewish family, first as a young newspaper boy in New York City, and later a very successful, ambitious businessman. His mother (Rosa Rosanova) sees his skills, and encourages him, but the father and sister miss their old ramshackle home and old friends on the lower east side. This is one of the crossover films, where the soundtrack technology was invented while the film was being made. About halfway through the film, it switches from a silent film with title cards into a talking picture with sound track. Then it goes back to using title cards until the very end, with the final scene using sound again. Most of the cast had been making silent films for years, so they probably had to adjust to the sound portions. Good job by most of the cast. Papa Goldfish (Jean Hersholt) spends most of the film lamenting their new high-society lifestyle, and it gets annoying after a while. He won't even be happy when one of his kids gets engaged and married. We watch as Morris gets more and more successful, and he treats his own family very badly. Most of the story is told in dialogue, and after the big, grand opening, it looks like the rest was filmed in one room. This came out just before the big money crash of 1929, so we can assume that Morris will get what he deserves later, even if this story ends mostly on a sad note.