Hooray for the Warner Archive who are releasing Ann Dvorak films on DVD faster than I can write about them.

This week’s offering includes the Strange Love of Molly Louvain, directed by Michael Curtiz and co-starring Lee Tracy, Richard Cromwell, and Dvorak’s soon-to-be  husband, Leslie Fenton. It’s standard pre-code dealings with Dvorak  bearing a child out of wedlock, hooking up with a thug, getting  mixed up in shady dealings, and going on the lamb incognito as a bleached blonde. While it’s not quite as riveting as Three on a Match, the Strange Love of Molly Louvain is one of the few films where Ann is the focus of the film and, as usual, she makes the most of it.

As I discussed previously, the film contains one of my all time favorite Ann Dvorak scenes where she gets to do a scat version of “Penthouse Serenade” and briefly performs one of her own compositions, “Gold Digger Baby.” Molly Louvain is also an important film in the annals of Ann Dvorak history because it’s where she hooked up with Leslie Fenton. The two had met a few weeks earlier on New Years Eve, but the sparks flew on the set of this film and the pair would soon elope to Arizona.

I need to give a quick note of credit to the blog All Talking! All Singing! All Dancing! who caught this DVD release before I did.

In light of this unexpected release, I am really looking forward to what other 1930s Warner Bros flicks the Warner Archive has in store for 2010.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 at 7:49 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.