Gable SleepWalk

Whatever that spark that Gable had in his movies is definitely missing in his "performance" in this movie. He's just walking through it and saying the lines. I believe his company was involved in producing it - makes me wonder about what happened that made him obviously not want to do the picture - the awful script? The casting of Yvonne DeCarlo (who I really liked in other pictures and as Lily Munster) who is too old for the part and doesn't have a dot of Southern charm within her despite supposedly being brought up as " a daughter of the Ol' South." Or was he still "dead" inside from losing his beloved Lombard?

And Sidney Poitier seems to be in another movie entirely. I agree with what another poster said about his attitude that he wouldn't have survived very long at all in the real society of the times. A black man in his position would have struck for dignity but would have been much more subtle in manipulating his passage down the street and so forth. It was one of the more interesting ideas in the script when he talks about how the white man Gable thought he was doing his "adopted son" a favor by bringing him up with a white cultural background had actually damaged him in a lot of ways by doing that in those restrictive times. Cultural identity is important to the human condition. I liked the part in the Blind Side when Sandra Bullock's character, in adopting a black son, does make some effort to remind and keep her son in touch with his beginnings so that he is a more complete individual. She teaches him how to function in her world (ordering in a fine restaurant, etc.) but she encourages him to bring his closest friends from his neighborhood to dinner.

I'd say that this movie is worth at least a scan and watch on Netflix.