CLAUDIA

New Zealand Listener, Volume 12, Issue 292, 26 January 1945, Page 12

CLAUDIA

(20th Century-Fox)

PREFER the rather more realistic treatment of» the facts of life (and death) which is contained in this picture. And although it may be only

a passing phase, 1 am also predisposed towards films which put the emphasis on character rather than on incident. Claudia, the child-wife, is very much a "character" — an exasperating, even a maddening creature; the female equivalent of the hobbledehoy, neither a girl nor a woman. But as portrayed by Dorothy McGuire, who first created the role in Rose Franken’s play on Broadway, Claudia’s gawkish posturing, her infuriating fidgeting, and what the psychologists would call her motherfixation, are not merely believable but even authentic. There is, of course, exaggeration in the role: so much so that Claudia is less a portrait than a caricature of a type which, fortunately for the sanity of the human race (and particularly of husbands), is fairly rare. Yet, as in all good caricature, there is a solid basis of exact observation. (continued ‘on next page)

(continued from previous page) The film owes most of its success to Miss McGuire, but it owes a great deal also to Robert Young and Ina Claire. The former portrays her husband, a doting, likeable fellow, with the patience of Job. The latter portrays her mother, a sensible, warm-hearted woman, who fully realises that the chief hindrance to Claudia’s development is her selfattachment to the maternal apronstrings. Together these two cushion Claudia against the rude shocks of life; treat with indulgence her practice of listening to conversations on the partyline, and (a little less indulgently) her attempt to prove that she has sexappeal by philandering with a neighbouring English playwright. Yet Claudia’s protectors are ultimately responsible for the shock which snaps the apron-strings and turns her from a child into a woman. It is her discovery, on the same day, that she is going to have a baby and that her mother is going to die (of cancer) that does it. As somebody said recently about Mr. Churchill, Claudia has some of the defects of its considerable. virtues. Its origin on the stage gives the film good situations, good character-drawing, and good dialogue, but it also restricts the action to a few settings and allows words

to take precedence over deeds. Again, two of the characters — the playwright (Reginald Gardiner) who is "so English that he is really British,’ and the Russian opera singer (Olga Baclanova) who persuades Claudia to sell her husband’s beloved farm-are grossly overdrawn. But, on the whole, this is a worthwhile picture. While many of its situations are comic to the point of being farcical, I would hesitate to label the whole thing as farce. Indeed, in its less scatter-brained moments, the story is even genuinely moving.