An absolute waste of money

Admirable film.

Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

This movie has a great cast, headlined by Greer Garson and Clark Gable, and including Thomas Mitchell and Joan Blondell. The director, Victor Fleming, had given us such masterpieces as the Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, and Captains Courageous. How then could such a group make such a truly awful movie? Well, to begin with, the script is awful almost past belief. It meanders from here to there, provides no decent motivations for the characters, who are at best two-dimensional caricatures. These characters are not interesting or even likable. And some of them disappear for long stretches of time.But everything is wrong here. Gable's character is thoroughly despicable. It's one thing to be a macho sort. Gable had brought that off, in spades, with Rhett Butler. But this sailor is both offensive and uninteresting.So then, why does Garson fall for him, and so quickly? There is no indication.Everything is wrong with this script. Garson and especially Gable try to salvage it, but it's a truly lost cause.Don't waste your time on this. Why MGM plunked its major stars into a truly lost cause I cannot guess.

Slow-moving and philosophical at the beginning, this 1945 film turns into a true gem. No wonder the billboards said that year that Gable is back (from the army) and Garson has got him.The story of two people, entirely different, who find love, wed and soon realize that his involvement in the merchant marine will adversely affect their lives together.Two wonderful supporting performances are by Thomas Mitchell and Joan Blondell, 2 friends of the pair.The film marked a reunion for Gable, Mitchell, and briefly Harry Davenport. All 3 starred in the epic, "Gone With the Wind,"The picture beautifully goes from comedy to tragedy to redemption without losing its balance.

Gable and Garson make for a poor pairing in this overlong limp love story that goes in circles for over two hours. Gable fresh from war service looks like he's aged considerably and his tired abrasive performance shows it.Harry Patterson (Gable) has a girl in every port and plans never to get tied down. Wandering into a library with a shipmate friend he meets staid and proper librarian Emily Sears (Garson) who is at first put off by the lug but opposites are known to attract and they ending up running off to Reno and getting hitched. But Harry's no land lubber and the two split up but not before Emily gets knocked-up. An oblivious Harry goes back to sea and his old ways but it just ain't the same.There is little finesse to be found in Gables performance, just bluster. He does a lot of jabbering and doesn't really connect with anyone in the film. Garson's Emily on the other hand is too delicate and restrained to do a one-eighty. Victor Fleming's direction is loose and uninspired and the production values erratic with some terrible back projection. "Gable's back and Garson's got'em" went the phrase back then but after seeing this you can keep them.

Those were alternate tag lines that MGM offered to Greer Garson when she complained about "Gable's back and Garson's got him".This really is a wonderful movie, but perhaps a bit hard to understand after only one viewing. It certainly wasn't what the public was expecting in 1945/6. After seeing it several times I find it just gets better and better.Gable chews up scenery, knocks down doors, punches a few guys, and kisses some beautiful women, all because he is fed up with life and with the sorry state of mankind. When he meets Greer, he backs her up against a library shelf to intimidate her but she doesn't budge. He can't understand why this "tomato" doesn't fall for his rough charm the way most women do. It takes him the whole movie to realize that Greer is exactly what he's been looking for all along.Greer is first repulsed by Gable, then fascinated, then jealous of Joan Blondell, eventually infatuated with him, and finally resigned to losing him to the sea and to his quest for the elusive quality that he calls "it". His pal Thomas Mitchell realizes that she is just what Gable needs.Garson and Gable are great together. If you're a fan of either, then you'll need to see this movie.And you'll learn neat stuff like how to mesmerize a chicken and how inexpensive groceries were in 1945.You'll even get to see Greer imitating a rooster. It's almost as good as her sea lion imitation in "Julia Misbehaves".