Forgotten (1933)

This was a major surprise, I purchased this DVD because it stared June Clyde, I’ve seen one of her movies, I liked her so I wanted to see more of her stuff. But when I put in the DVD and the credits came up I saw the Natalie Moorhead, I freaked out, like a child on Christmas, I had no idea she was in this. Like so many of her movies, she wasn’t in this much, but she was the best of the bunch as usual. The movie is about a Widower who owns a dye company and lives with his son and daughter, he tends to not get along well with his son’s and their wives and they soon convince him to retire and then force him to a retirement home. But his daughter who loves him dearly helps him start a new dye business and almost puts his son’s business out of business, but they merge and the whole family lives happily together ever after. It’s was an ok movie, a bit slow, most of the acting was fine, at times they seemed a bit bored almost like they were reading their lines. As for Natalie, I’m not being bias, but she was the best, with what little she had to do. She plays one of the wives’ who get annoyed with the father, like most of her roles she is somewhat stuck up, she plays those roles so well. Unlike the others whose walk is straight and talk in the same tone the whole time, she is more natural and believable, to the littlest detail she seems real while the others are just acting, again I ask why wasn’t she a star? One very interesting thing I noticed is in the final scenes she is wearing a dress that I believe she wore in two other movies, I need to find out if they are from the same studio or is this one of her own dresses, I wonder if I’ll see it in any other movies.

Beloved Brat (1938)

1938, near the end of Natalie’s career, but she manages to get a fairly big role in a major studio film(Warner Bros), although this is a quickie, only a little over an hour long. This movie is similar to her movie “What becomes of the Children” as it’s about parents to don’t care for their children and the children become bad or suffer. The star of this movie is Bonita Granville, of Nancy Drew fame, she plays the child who causes havoc for anyone around her because her parents don’t play with her and won’t let her have any friends and any fun. She tries to runaway but gets picked up by her butler who she hates, and causes them to wreck their car. The butler dies, she lies that it was her fault but out of gilt she tells the truth and is sent to a reform school. Slowly but surely she gets better and loves being at the reform school and then refuses to go home when her parents come back for her, but all ends well and the family is happily reunited. Not a great movie, but seeing Natalie in a bigger role, as the mother, was great to see, as always she did a fantastic job, she was always good playing not so nice people. She looked very beautiful, yet still a bit weird seeing her as a brunette, it makes her look older, but it worked here. I like Bonita Granville, she’s always a lot of fun, but she over acted a bit in this film, but still good.