Very well executed

Don't Believe the Hype

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Boom Town is a Love story, a Drama, a Western, and an Adventure all put into one movie. The film is about 2 guys who love the same girl and love Black Gold. The movie stars Spencer Tracy as Square John Sand, Clark Gable as Big John McMasters, and Claudette Colbert as (Elizabeth) Betsy Bartlett. The movie is a 1940's Classic, and I think it was almost as good as Gone With the Wind. This is the last of three films that Spencer Tracy and Clark Gable starred in together which included San Francisco, Test Pilot, and Boom Town. The Film was star packed. I instantly knew who the actors were once I heard their voices. I especially liked how it was set in a western style and a modern style (for that time anyway) I thought it was going to be like every other western film that I've seen in black and white but it wasn't it was more adventurous and interesting. I especially enjoyed the scenes that showed Big John and Square John fist fighting. I later researched that Spencer Tracy's stunt double actually hit Clark Gable during a scene, because Clark Gable decided that he wanted to do his own stunts.

This is a mildly entertaining tale though more comedy than anything else. Pure Hollywood slush. Set in the era of boom/bust oil wells we are treated to the saga of various characters who swindle their way to the top. When they lose it all they are more than happy to start all over again.The film preaches that lying, cheating and stealing is just fine as is exploiting others and ruining their businesses by fair means or foul.Mind you that ain't far from the truth as that is how the likes of crooks such as Bernard Madoff and his ilk got rich. And this picture seems to glorify behaving dishonestly to get ahead.In its' favor the movie does have some genuine superstars and I agree that Hedy Lamarr is the most beautiful woman on screen ever; then and now. Clarke Gable looks like the washed out selfish drunk that I am sure he always was. So if you like a half decent older movie with a certain political agenda and some big names in it then this is for you.4/10

This was the biggest film of the year for MGM in 1940. They used four of their biggest stars, any one of whom could have starred in their own films.Clark Gable already had an Oscar for It Happened One Night, another nomination for Mutiny on the Bounty, and was nominated in the 1940 Academy Awards for Gone with the Wind.Spencer Tracy, a nine-time Oscar nominee, already had a nomination for San Francisco, a win for Captains Courageous, and a win the previous year for Boy's Town.Three-time Oscar nominee Claudette Colbert already had a win for It happened One Night, which she did with Gable, and a nomination for Private Worlds.Frank Morgan had gotten one of his two nominations for The Affairs of Cellini.And, our Star of the Month, Hedy Lamarr, was just beginning her career.This was a raucous film with all the excitement that you would expect in one about wildcatters in the oil business and featured barroom fights, streets of mud, and stories ripped from the headlines. It was an amazing love story about two men in love with the same woman. It was pure entertainment.

BOOM TOWN can't decide whether it wants to be a buddy flick (CLARK GABLE and SPENCER TRACY) about wildcatters, a domestic romance with an "other woman" angle (CLAUDETTE COLBERT, HEDY LAMARR), or just a big brawling adventure epic about losers and winners amid gushing oil.Somehow, it manages to be all three--which makes for a rather uneven story that serves as a star-gazer for fans who like to watch the foursome go through their paces even though the script isn't strong enough to support them and their misadventures.Claudette is lovely in the chief romantic role as Gable's love interest, but it's HEDY LAMARR (who strolls into the story pretty late in the film) who dazzles with her close-ups and that amazing beauty.Gable is right at home in this get-rich-quick-scheme drilling for oil, since he was an oil rigger at one time before his movie days. He and Tracy are both in love with Claudette--but after she falls for Gable she regrets his close working relationship with Lamarr--and that's where the plot starts to thicken but loses credibility at the same time.Lamarr's role is so underwritten that she hardly has time to register strongly as a sophisticated woman attracted to Gable. The focus is hardly on the women involved, but instead the main thrust of the plot is carried by Gable and Tracy and their relationship.It's the sort of macho buddy film you'd think Gable's friend Victor Fleming would direct, but instead it's Jack Conway behind the reigns. He keeps the action flowing, but somehow none of the characters manage to be really involving and it runs a little too long, just short of tedium, since no new ground is explored.Summing up: Mainly of interest for Gable fans--he plays his blustery devil may care self in great style, fresh from his triumph as Rhett Butler.