Review of Saturday's Children

I've been watching any John Garfield films I can lately, and so far, this has been the most disappointing. Garfield is so miscast. I can't imagine what the studio was thinking. The film attempts to deal with the issue of young marriage facing poverty, but every character is so naive that I often found myself wondering if there was a gas leak in their building. It's the only rational way to explain their inability to cope with major problems at anything other than a fifth grade level. Garfield, who was Brando before there even was a Brando, is thoroughly wasted here. He plays his character as a sort of slack-jawed mope, who either pouts or widens his eyes at every little thing. Anne Shirley is attractive, but bland. Claude Rains starts promisingly, but even he can't surmount the problems inherent in the script. The film also commits the horror of having a character use the title in a dramatic moment in the end, summing up the entire film just before the credits roll. As if people really talk like that. John Garfield is amazing, and worth watching in just about anything. But not this.