A Life of Her Own

source: A Life of Her Own

This is melodrama near it's best - offering style, class, surprisingly good performances and an almost believable script. George Cukor as director and George Folsey as director of photography are a solid combination - drawing the viewer into a rather engrossing drama. It's also quite unlike the general Hollywood production (it's reminiscent of the realistic sharp edge that might have come from a writer more like Clifford Odettes). As far as original screenplays go this must rank as one of writer Isobel Lennart's best dramatic character studies. And, could be one time that enforced studio alterations just may have improved the final outcome. Turner is convincing as the small town girl striving for a modeling career in hard bitten N.Y. city. Milland is always reliable and carries his guilt ridden out-of-town businessman role with fitting aplomb. All performances by an unusually cast, fully professional ensemble, are strong. It could be said that Turner was a little too mature for her part and some script elements might not always gel but this remains class entertain for those that want their melodrama treated with less gloss and more character driven. It was obvious this material was never going to be popular stuff. Bronislau Kaper's (Lili '53) dramatic but melodic score sets the emotional tone for this above average piece of storytelling and ranks as one of his best.

A Life Of Her Own casts Lana Turner as a small town girl who with her beauty goes to New York for a career as a model. She's got the looks, but has she the character for the profession? She reports some six months after the agency that Tom Ewell runs called for her. It was a simple matter of economics, Lana just didn't have the train fare from Kansas. But very much like Lana Turner in real life, discovered in Schwab's Drugstore in Hollywood because of her beauty and made a film star, Turner becomes a success in the modeling profession. Anything's better than life in Kansas and Turner's after more than a career. She meets Ray Milland who is a mine owner from Montana back east to raise some money with the help of lawyer Louis Calhern. Of course the inevitable happens as it usually does in these films, but the problem is Milland is slightly married to Margaret Phillips. Here's where the film gets real sudsy. Phillips is a paraplegic as a result of an automobile accident. The subject is rather delicately handled with the Code still in place, but the clear inference is that Milland is not enjoying any kind of sex life any more. So he's more than willing to get involved with Turner. The Code parameters both limit how the subject is handled and the inevitable outcome of the film which I won't reveal. George Cukor directed A Life Of Her Own and the film is definitely missing his usual flair for 'women's' pictures. And the film is clearly Lana's with the rest of the cast in support. Some younger players at MGM like Jean Hagen and Phyllis Kirk play other models, but Ann Dvorak in one of her last films has a couple of scenes as an older woman trying to make a comeback in a profession that lives and dies on youth. She only has a couple of scenes, but they've got some real bite to them. I wish we had a lot more of her in the film. A Life Of Her Own is not one of the better films for Cukor, Turner, or Milland, but it's entertaining enough given the Code parameters it was made under.

Tale of a woman coming from Kansas to New York only to hit it big as a model, but unable to capture the man she loved. Lana Turner is that woman and at the beginning of the film, she acts just like that girl who had been discovered in a drug store sipping soda some years before. There is one terrific performance by Ann Dvorak, an aging model, whose life is on the skids. Dvorak represents what can happen to women as they get older and are not able to cope with the changes that it brings. Miss Dvorak is the embodiment of that discontented woman, bitter and not knowing what else life will bring her. Unfortunately, her appearance in the film is a brief one, as she commits suicide. The rest of the story is devoted to Turner falling in love with Ray Milland, a wealthy married man whose wife is wheel-chair bound due to a car accident that he caused. When love blossoms between the two, Turner becomes hard-boiled in her intentions to tell the wife of what is going on. Of course, kindness and reality set in when Turner sees how dependent the wife is. Louis Calhern is very good as the man about town with a heart and Barry Sullivan is quite adequate as a gigolo, who knows what life can be all about.

George Cukor was a well-know, good director who helmed films such as The Philadelphia Story, Born Yesterday and the last film John Dillinger saw, Manhattan Melodrama. This turkey, with Ray Milland, Lana Turner and Tom Ewell (recently on TCM) was laughable in its portrayal of a model on her way up in NY and the tawdry romance with a married man (Milland). Of course they toss in Milland's wife, who just happens to be crippled with no use of her legs (she does walk haltingly for a moment with two canes) to play on the sympathy of a woman wronged, though that plot line goes no where. To say this is a bad film is an understatement. Turner looks overweight and her costumes don't do her any favors either. The dialogue is stilted, stupid and overwrought; I would lay most of the blame on the screenwriter for this silly, pretentious and altogether forgettable movie.

Well...most of the people who have reviewed this movie don't seem to think much of it, even the ones who like it. So I'll go out on a limb and praise it to the skies. I think it contains one of Lana Turner's most interesting and powerful performances. The supporting cast is brilliant, right down to the smallest roles, but the highest marks go to Ann Dvorak and the frequently underrated (to my mind) Barry Sullivan. The musical score by Kaper is one of the finest of all time, with the main theme echoing throughout the film in the manner of Raksin's Laura. It's all fresh on my mind because I watched it again last night...I enjoy it more and more every time I watch it. And...I think the ending is one of the most life-affirming moments in movies, as Lana trashes the bogus "good luck charm" and truly understands that no one else can "make" her happy...A Life of Her Own indeed! Thanks for reading.

As other reviewers have noted, the first 15 or 20 minutes of this film are quite watchable -- energetic, lots going on, well photographed. But when Ann Dvorak starts getting plastered, the speechifying starts, and there isn't one honest note that follows. It all becomes very overwrought, with ridiculous, exposition-filled dialog...and some pretentious speech making at the end. When Ray Milland enters the story, it basically becomes a poor remake of "The Divorcée" with the last act pretty much identical -- possible spoiler here -- with his wife revealed as a cripple in a wheelchair. There is zero chemistry between Turner and Milland. Milland is totally miscast, which doesn't help. Don't be fooled by the fact that George Cukor directed this because it's a pretty awful film, made worse by the fact the expectations you have given all of this A-list talent.

Lana Turner goes into the modeling world hoping to get discovered. Along the way, she meets Ray Milland, who's a married man, and of course they start having feelings for each other. Ann Dvorak (from Paul Muni's "Scarface") is great in a supporting role. In fact, some would say she steals the show, because the viewer thinks of her even when she's not on the screen, due to circumstances I'm not going into. Barry Sullivan, who was frequent costar of Lana's, is on hand with his shoulder for Lana to cry on. For such an unknown movie of Lana's, one would think is just a hum-drum black-and-white movie. But, "A Life of Her Own" is a very well-written and insightful film which provides a mature approach to a woman's life at an older age, who is trying to find herself and what she really wants out of life, and what she doesn't want. An added plus which most reviewers have already alluded to, is the great music score to this film. It makes Ray and Lana's scenes feel very intimate. But when reality hits and she meets the wheelchair-bound wife. it does get rather depressing and downbeat. But the ending is very soothing, as she "is herself" with Barry and visits the view one more time of Ann Dvorak's old apartment building and where she doesn't want to wind up. It's a shame to think only Lana fans would be attracted to this film. It's one for all those who want something intelligent and for people, who though older and not quite settled, are still yearning for "a life of their own."

Small-town girl goes to big city to break into modeling, falls in love. Conflicts arise, are resolved. I would call this second-rate Cukor. The pluses: A good amount of wise, perceptive dialog in the cynical vein, well choreographed ensemble scenes in claustrophobic interiors (the hubbub at a busy modeling agency, a crowded restaurant, a hotel visitors' lounge, a wild party in Turner's apartment) and two strong supporting performances: Ann Dvorak as a has-been alcoholic model at the beginning and Margaret Phillips as the stoic, paraplegic wife toward the end (lesser turns have won Oscars). Lana Turner is appealing to the eye but miscast - too slick and mature for a Kansas girl trying to break into the modeling world. She is persuasive only when she is playing anger, disgust or drunkenness. Ray Milland with his patrician accent convinces no one that he runs a copper mine in the boonies of Montana and has seldom seen a big city. Neither performer even attempts an appropriate regional accent. The central problem, however, is that Turner and Milland do not click as a couple. And both seem bored.

Lana Turner heads an excellent cast in "A Life of Her Own," a 1950 film directed by George Cukor. Its other stars are Ray Milland, Louis Calhern, Margaret Phillips, Barry Sullivan, Tom Ewell, Ann Dvorak, and Jean Hagen. Both the beginning of the film and the end are the best parts; the in between is incredibly slow. Turner plays a young woman from Kansas who comes to New York to break into the modeling business. She meets what could be her future if she's not careful: a washed up, alcoholic, desperate has-been, beautifully portrayed by Ann Dvorak. No need to tell you what happens there - you've seen it a million times. As her career progresses, Turner meets a married millionaire, Steve, played by Ray Milland. She knows he's married and it starts off platonically enough. But, as we learn what seems like hours later, he's a lot more than married. This is a great cast, right down to the smaller roles, which includes Phyllis Kirk, one of my favorites, and Hermes Pan, who so often worked with Fred Astaire on choreography. Turner is excellent and has some fine dramatic scenes; Milland is handsome and sympathetic as her boyfriend. Margaret Phillips, as his wife, does a marvelous job, and Tom Ewell is a joy. Actually, everyone is very good. Alas, there's not much of a script here and you know what's going to happen along the way. The very end shows Cukor's directing mastery. Given what he had to work with by way of a script, it's a very well done movie. I shudder to think what it would have been like in someone else's hands.