Without Love (1945)

It is a performances centric movie

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

No, this is not at the level of the better known Tracy-Hepburn movies, like Desk Set or Woman of the Year. But it's pleasant enough viewing for the time it takes.What I found interesting was that sometimes the two main characters really hurt each other, something we don't see in the later T-H comedies. These are not perfect people, and they are not always careful of each other's feelings.As several others have noted, Lucille Ball gets good material here and does a fine job of it. Somewhat like Mary Astor in Philadephia Story.For me, the weakest part is Keenan Wynn's relationship to Edwina. What could she possibly have to attract him, or any man? So, a pleasant enough pastime, though I will probably have forgotten most of it by tomorrow.

This movie was quite slow and drawn-out, silly and dated, and not very funny either. The main idea about a couple who marry for convenience, and intend not to share a bedroom, but then develop feelings for each other after all, is quite good though - although not original. So much more could have been made by it. What one wants to see in a story with that theme, is the sexual tension slowly growing between the man and woman, and some innuendo... that is the whole point. Instead there were too many other, uninteresting, people involved here, and there was too much running in and out through doors like in a drawing room comedy on the theater stage. The whole movie is carried by the two leads: Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn. I like it that Hollywood already in the 1940:s could make a love story with leads who were no longer young (especially that the woman is no longer young), and who did not have the traditional perfect handsome/pretty looks but instead more individual looks. The couple makes the movie worth watching once, in spite of all its shortcomings.

In Wahington during WWII, a scientist and a rich widow enter into a marriage of convenience. Arguably the least well known of the nine films they co-starred in, Tracy and Hepburn are OK here but the script is nothing special. In fact, it's a rather silly affair about him developing a high altitude oxygen mask for fighter pilots and her becoming his assistant. Ball and Wynn provide some humor, and Grahame has a bit role in just her second film. The script is by the team that wrote "The Philadelphia Story," but the inspiration is lacking. It is directed by someone named Bucquet, who suffered an untimely death soon after making this, his last film.

Philip Barry's play about a scientist/inventor who rooms with a widow during the war might've fallen flat with a less-experienced cast; it is middling material, weighted with palaver, not even offering anything in the way of surprises. However, Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn are well-attuned to these characters (and to each other) and make the most of it. Tracy is talked into a platonic marriage with Kate, but eventually feels the pangs of real romance. The play's stagy action is opened-up expertly for the screen, with talky scenes nicely balanced by lively set-pieces (such as the train-sequence, the best moment in the film). The colorful supporting cast, including Gloria Grahame (in a bit part) and Keenan Wynn, perform with aplomb, plowing right through the contrivances. As Kate's girlfriend, Lucille Ball gives one of her best performances, and she has a classic retort to Spencer Tracy who commands his dog to lie down (Ball to Tracy: "Who, me?"). Not a perfect showcase for the leads, but very pleasant nonetheless. *** from ****