I quite enjoyed this one when I first saw it many years ago, but it doesn't stand up well. Barrymore is the main problem. His is a ranting, self-glorifying, drown out everyone else in the cast performance, which, to my surprise, director Mike Curtiz indulges rather than trying to keep a lid on it. And I don't know that it was a good idea of the screenwriters not only to keep so much of the moribund stage play in the action, thus slowing it down, and then pandering Barrymore with long speeches, and thus slowing things down even further. Director Mike Curtiz seems to be in awe of Barrymore and favor him with eye- rolling close-ups and long takes at the expense of other members of the cast, especially Marian Marsh. In fact some of our favorite people have very little footage, including Boris Karloff who makes a significant entrance and then totally disappears. We do see a lot of Donald Cook, however, despite the fact that he is, at best, a rather stodgy, humdrum actor with – at least in this movie – little in the way of charisma. I'm not surprised the movie failed dismally at the box office. Sometimes, not often, mind you, audiences showed good taste! This movie is available on very good Warner Brothers DVD, but with no extras, alas!
Review of The Mad Genius
