Yes, My Darling Daughter (1939)

Memorable, crazy movie

Best movie of this year hands down!

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

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.

This rather dated comedy involves young Priscilla Lane going unchaperoned to spend a weekend at a lake cabin with Jeffrey Lynn before he goes off to Belgium for a career change and a bit of excitement. It got all the censor's hackles up because the two at the moment are not intending to be married. Today it wouldn't raise a blip.I'm in agreement with the other reviewer who said there's a whole lot of talking going on. Not as much as in one of Bette Davis's worst films Winter Meeting, still a lot. Today the young folk would be getting it on.Lane and her grandmother May Robson are having a great old time pointing out to mama Fay Bainter that back in the day she was a frisky young thing herself, all that suffragette activity etc. Fay reacts like a mom, but she's hoisted on her own petard by her past.Ian Hunter plays dad and he's out sailing on Long Island sound while all this is going on. When he arrives on the scene this pillar of the community proves singularly ineffectual. His sister Genevieve Tobin and house guest Roland Young function as kibitzers. Hard to believe back in the day that Yes My Darling Daughter got the Legion of Decency in such a snit. The play by Mark Reed ran for 405 performances with a cast I'm sure you mostly never heard of. Just noting the Broadway cast list you can see how the play was expanded a bit for the screen.One has to wonder that in 1939 those who saw Yes My Darling Daughter had to wonder what happens to all the characters the following year when the Nazis march into Belgium. It certainly had me wondering.This is a most dated but amusing film.

It's clear that Warners was attempting to repeat the same success they had with "Four Daughters" right down to casting a number of the same actors. Rolland Young and Fay Bainter (along with the wonderful May Robson) are among my favorite character actors of the era.Priscilla Lane is just fine, but Jeffrey Lynn really isn't a particular good actor. Yes, he was fine in "All This and Heaven Too", but he's dull as dishwater in "A Letter to Three Wives". Joseph Mankiewicz referred to him as a "leaner" - a weak actor. He was right.All in all, it's a very watchable Warners programmer of the late 1930's. I can think better ways to waste my time.

Yes, this movie is dated and yes, it has plot holes and ridiculous moments. But that doesn't matter. When I watch this movie I just go along with it and enjoy each moment.May Robson, as always, is a delight. She is one of my very favorite supporting actresses and she does not disappoint here. Her funniest moments in this movie aren't even spoken...they are her reactions to all that is going on around her.Priscilla Lane played the role of a sweet, innocent girl very well. (Random side note: at times her voice reminds me of Ginger Rogers.) The character of Ellen was a tad annoying at times (come on, what do you think Doug wanted to do in that cabin) but for the most part I enjoyed Ellen. The character of Doug was not well developed at all. I suspect that was intentional since the focus of this movie was on the relationships between the women. I would have liked to see a bit more to Doug, though. All we really know about him is that he's going to Belgium to sell razors.I did enjoy the side plot of the previous relationship between Ann and Jay. The character of Jay seemed out of place at times, but Roland Young was his usual marvelous self.Yes, My Darling Daughter is a thoroughly entertaining movie. The subject manner is dated, but the movie kept my attention and even made me laugh out loud more than once.

Based on a stage play and it really shows. (The characters in this movie talk and talk endlessly.)The situation, with our plucky heroine going off for the weekend with a boyfriend who is soon to leave for an overseas job, just might be seen as racy for the late thirties. It is made pretty clear early on that Priscilla Lane would just never do that sort of thing and not return as pure as the newly fallen snow, but everybody in this movie has to talk about it - her mom, her aunt, her dad, her grandmother (the hammy May Robson), the mom's old boyfriend from way back when (played by Roland Young - and what is he doing here anyway? His character's presence makes no sense at all)- and the quality of the talk is moralizing and dreadfully dull. (The movie is not helped at all by the presence of Jeffrey Lynn, just about the stodgiest and dullest young leading man this side of Ronald Reagan.) Priscilla Lane could be genuinely charming at times, but she doesn't have a chance against a lousy script and heavy-handed direction. See it once, if you really have to see have see every movie that Priscilla Lane ever made....