Wonderfully offbeat film!

Strong and Moving!

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.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Bette goes down Kay Francis territory in this 30's women's film, not getting a break from the men in her life (which are many), yet finding sympathy in the oddest places-her men's wives.She is the widow of a gangster and is being followed around by a reporter out for a scoop on "Where are yesterday's gangsters?". Now working for a highly respectable lawyer (Ian Hunter), she runs into an old beau (Henry Fonda) whose tyrant father (Donald Crisp) dominates his life and instantly sets out to keep Fonda and Davis apart. When they elope, Crisp confronts the two on their honeymoon, and Davis decides to leave behind the man she loves, apparently realizing she's married to a wimp. Guess what happens nine months later. Yep, Davis is now a single mother, and has managed to keep Fonda from finding out about their son. Hunter, who is a loveless marriage with Katharine Alexander, makes Davis his mistress, something his wife doesn't seem to mind. But when tragedy strikes and the two women are snapped together in a photo, the scandal sheet makes it appear like a slugfest. Fonda turns up, having married a sweet society lady (Margaret Lindsay), but she was crippled in a car accident while on their honeymoon, so he is desperate to get Davis back. Papa Crisp makes another threat against Davis, so she must take drastic steps to ensure that he does not destroy her life again.It is ironic that Davis's married name from her first husband is Mary Haines, the same name as the cheated on wife in the then hit Broadway play "The Women", filmed two years later by MGM. Like MGM's Norma Shearer (Mary in the movie version of "The Women"), Davis was queen of her studio (Warner Brothers), having just taken over that title from the reigning queen of mother love sob stories (Kay Francis). The problem in the movie is that it is so unbelievable that a seemingly tough mob widow would not stand up to the threats of the nasty father, played by the normally likable Donald Crisp. I found his dialogue to be so inane that I cringed every time he came on screen. All of the men are one dimensional-Crisp is totally nasty, Fonda is a wimp, and Hunter is so extremely noble he appears to be the male Ann Harding. There are nice scenes between Davis and the two women in her lover's lives, and Dwane Day gives a cute performance as Davis's four year old son. Mary Philips is also memorable as Davis's devoted companion.Warner Brothers had their share of mother love stories, most notably several with Kay Francis, including one of my all time favorites, the same year's "Confession". Those ones are better recommended than this one. Davis would fare better two years later as an unwed mother in the excellent "The Old Maid".

It's a good thing that the following year from That Certain Woman, Bette Davis and Henry Fonda got to make Jezebel and acquit themselves well in a drama of substance. It certainly showed that as a team they could do better than That Certain Woman and have it be the only film they would be judged on as a screen team.For such a noble thing Bette's been around the track quite a bit and gets a few more turns before the film ends. As a teen she marries a notorious hoodlum who is killed in a gun battle and she's trying to live it down. She's working under an assumed name as a secretary to wealthy attorney Ian Hunter. When exposed Hunter doesn't care because he's in a rather loveless marriage to the rather frigid Katharine Alexander.Bette likes him OK, but her heart is set on playboy Henry Fonda. They do get married, but Fonda's father Donald Crisp comes running after his son and gets the marriage annulled. Of course he can't annul what Fonda left to remember him by. Bette doesn't tell him about their kid and later Fonda marries socialite Anita Louise who is later paralyzed from a car crash. If you're a devotee of soap operas the plot can take any number of directions from here and I won't say.If That Certain Woman were made today it would be debuting on the Lifetime Channel. From what I've just described there's enough material here for a dozen soaps. One common thing I noticed in this film. The women are all noble and self sacrificing, especially Anita Louise. The men however are all dogs, between the lusting in his heart Hunter, the weakling Fonda, the tyrannical Crisp, even the reporter who tries to blackmail Davis, Hugh O'Connell. Now that's an article of faith to get on the Lifetime Channel.Bette and Hank do their best with it all, but there are enough tears to fill Lake Erie in this film and suds enough to wash the uniforms at the Great Lakes Naval Training station.

Secretary Bette Davis has her dishonorable past unearthed after a reporter breaks the story that she's the widow of a notorious gangster once involved in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre; this leads to the quick dissolution of Davis' even quicker marriage to Henry Fonda, but not before Bette can conceive a child! Some dry, amusing wisecracks in this remake of the silent film "The Trespasser", and also some unintended laughs and head-scratching details as well. Davis keeps refusing offers of cigarettes (!), she types a letter to Fonda we never get to read, she packs her kid off without his toys and then blows forlornly on his whistle. The kid is a solemn tyke who seems to have a fixation on being a sailor, even while Fonda's new wife pays Davis a visit (in a wheelchair!) and trades confessions with her in front of a roaring fire which never seems to die down. Busy programmer would not be worth much interest were it not for Bette's rather superb performance; she's serious and focused--and sensitive when she should be--and she grounds this story in a bit of reality. Henry Fonda and the supporting players are also very good, especially Mary Phillips as Amy. The film opens confusingly and takes a while to get its bearings, yet the sequence where Bette meets her father-in-law for the first time is a superbly controlled dramatic moment in which everyone excels. Not a particularly witty or gripping picture, but certainly not bad either. ** from ****

First, I love Bette Davis. This movie is among the worst she ever made. Bette Davis wonderful at playing modern women, especially outspoken, bitchy or evil women. She showed little talent for playing mealy-mouthed, self-sacrificing women. I think most of her fans will be appalled by this film, especially by the ending, which will leave most modern audiences speechless. Thank God that the following year, Bette co-starred with Henry Fonda in a classic, "Jezebel," and got her career back on track.