source: Torch Singer

Moviecut—Torch Singer

Torch Singer

After a slam bam, thank you mam, pregnancy, dad (David Manners) takes a slow boat to China and abandons chorus girl/singer Sally Trent (Claudette Colbert). She attempts to bring up the child but penniless she allows it to be adopted. She then works her way up the ladder as a torch singer in clubs before a fortuitous event turns her into a radio sensation that she manipulates into a search for her long lost daughter, Sally. Colbert handles the mawkishly melodramatic script well, in tears one moment, hard as nails in another. The script is all too pat however with its happily after ending drowning in suds. One absolutely touching and eloquent scene that does deserve mention is Trent arriving at a ramshackle home in hopes of finding her daughter who turns out to be a black child with the same name and date of birth. "Was she black?" asks the little girl. "I don't remember, it was long ago," Trent says with the perfect answer, reminding us we are all God's children..

***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** Great pre-code Hollywood musical/drama classic. One of Claudette Colbert best before "It Happened One Night". Great songs, Great acting. Claudette Colbert is beautiful with her full face. If you catch this, you're lucky. Claudette Colbert Sally Trent gets pregnant out of wedlock tries to take care of her own baby, but times get tough unwillingly gives her baby up for adoption agreeing never to see the baby again. She find jobs as a Torch Singer and becomes famous calling herself Mimi Benton. She also became Aunt Jenny a singer and bedtime singer on a radio show, a letter that comes through from one of her letter fans named Sally reminds her of her own daughter Sally, then through the radio show she tries to look for her daughter, she ends up finding her daughter, but not before the father of the child does. Also starring Ricardo Cortez, Lyda Roberti, David Manners.

Claudette Colbert sizzles in this "women's film" about a girl gone bad who's forced to give her illegitimate baby up for adoption and then sets out to find her years later after she's become a famous nightclub singer. This is melodrama good and proper, folks, so be prepared to suspend your disbelief if you're going to have a chance at enjoying it. But if you give in, you might just find what I found in this film, a sexy, sometimes funny, sometimes truly affecting story about a mother's love with an absolutely sensational actress making sure you buy it hook, line and sinker. Colbert is marvelous, and I couldn't take my eyes off of her whenever she's on the screen, which fortunately is most of the time. Grade: B+

It's fun to see Colbert warbling the blues (several times) and kiddies lullabies in this well made and directed soap. Unwed and unable to manage she gives up her baby and becomes a disreputable torch singer and the hottest attraction around. Colbert goes from forlorn unwed mother to Mae-Westian blues singer in a captivating role. "Realization" puts her "back on track" to find her daughter. All this in 72 minutes! Good support from Lyda Roberti, Ricardo Cortez and David Manners. It's a shame this isn't available on video.