The mark of a good actor (or actress) is how they either gain the viewer's empathy or conversely, elicit one's disgust for their character. In this film, Bette Davis does both, even though she doesn't make it to the end of the picture. Fans who are only familiar with Davis's later film roles might be surprised to see what a looker she was in her very early movies, an observation I've made note of as well regarding contemporaries like Joan Blondell, Angela Lansbury, and Barbara Stanwyck.
The story starts out about a scheme involving securities fraud and turns into a murder mystery about half way through. Arlene Bradford (Davis) fancies herself a high flying society gal but is mixed up with the wrong crowd to the consternation of her father (Arthur Byron) and sister Val (Margaret Lindsay) who looks to her older sibling for inspiration. At just over an hour you would think the story would whiz right by but there's a decent amount of character development along with the set up involving the stolen securities.
Once invested in the story though, a couple of head scratchers did turn up to puzzle this viewer. The first was when we learn that Arlene Bradford was already married to the heel Mayard/Buchard (Douglas Dumbrille) shortly after he throws her over. The difference in their ages was more than noticeable and seemed out of character with the way Davis's role was written. The other was the revelation in the final minutes that butler Thorne (Robert Barrat) was actually a police informant. So how'd he get on the family payroll?
The story starts out about a scheme involving securities fraud and turns into a murder mystery about half way through. Arlene Bradford (Davis) fancies herself a high flying society gal but is mixed up with the wrong crowd to the consternation of her father (Arthur Byron) and sister Val (Margaret Lindsay) who looks to her older sibling for inspiration. At just over an hour you would think the story would whiz right by but there's a decent amount of character development along with the set up involving the stolen securities.
Once invested in the story though, a couple of head scratchers did turn up to puzzle this viewer. The first was when we learn that Arlene Bradford was already married to the heel Mayard/Buchard (Douglas Dumbrille) shortly after he throws her over. The difference in their ages was more than noticeable and seemed out of character with the way Davis's role was written. The other was the revelation in the final minutes that butler Thorne (Robert Barrat) was actually a police informant. So how'd he get on the family payroll?