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A nurse named Laura (Diana Wynyard) in World War I has sex with a pilot (Robert Young), who dies soon after. She discovers she's pregnant so she agrees to marry another man (Lewis Stone) so the child will have a father. Years later her son Bob (Phillips Holmes) is grown and the world is on the brink of another world war. But Laura is vehemently anti-war and has raised her son the same. This leads to conflict as Laura's husband is now the US Secretary of State and expects Bob to fight for his country.

Fascinating movie with a lot of thought-provoking ideas and prescient look at a second world war and technological advances like television and videophones. Love the art deco sets. The acting is good with melodramatic Wynyard leading the way. Stone is fine in his usual rigid way. Holmes is terrific and one of the most natural actors in the cast. Robert Young makes the most of his limited screen time. Lovely Ruth Selwyn (wife of director Edgar Selwyn, thirty years her senior) is very likable as Holmes' love interest. May Robson is fine in a supporting role that's dripping with bitterness. It's a wonderful Pre-Code film. The opening scene has Young and Wynyard dressing after their lovemaking. Just a year later you wouldn't see a suggestive scene like that. Heck you wouldn't have seen this movie period since the plot involves premarital sex. The climactic scene where the enemy forces attack New York City is gripping stuff. A sad bit of irony is that, in the end of this film, Phillips Holmes' character enlists as a pilot and flies off to war. Holmes himself would enlist in World War II as a pilot and be killed in a mid-air collision in Canada.

For some reason, a lot of the reviewers on IMDb want to praise this mealy-mouthed pseudo-liberal talk-fest. Maybe this is because heroine Diana Wynyard makes a number of decent anti-war speeches throughout this film. In any event, I will admit Diana Wynyard is a good actress and did a good job in this film, and I appreciated the opening scene, a pre-code artifact indicating that Miss Wynward and Robert Young had engaged in pre-marital sex.

However, although the writer of Miss Wynyard's speeches misses entirely some of the most salient points of the anti-war point of view:

1. That war is often fought for the benefit of profiteers 2. That politicians goad nations to war by means of lies 3. That politicians, no matter what they say, generally seek empire when they go to war 4. That women, children, the sick, the poor, the elderly, and the disabled suffer the most when war is fought

That a film described by some as anti-war misses these and other major points is akin to giving the Nobel Peace Prize to a world leader who bombs weaker nations and sends drone weapons against civilians.

In fact, Miss Wynyard's character tends to trivialize the anti-war point of view by representing that point of view as a mere response to acute grief.

NYC is attacked in this film, in an eerie foreshadowing of 9/11, but the film says nothing about the actions leading up to the attack, the motivations of the attackers, or whether or not US politicians knew in advance of the attack (as Pres. Roosevelt did in the case of Pearl Harbor, but was looking for a justification to enter WWII).

War is represented then, not so much as the result of plans and actions and motivations, all of which should be deconstructed if we are ever to learn from history, but rather as a kind of Force of Nature, a unavoidable part of human experience, such as sex and love are. Hence the title. War as an expression of the human spirit.

In case you still might think this film is anti-war (Spoiler Alert!) then consider the fact that at the film's end, Miss Wynyard's son resolves his story arc by enlisting to fight in a jingoistic crescendo of inanity.

I'm busting on this film so bad because others in this time period knew the straight scoop on war. Graham Greene did, hence his classic 1936 novel 'This Gun for Hire.' Smedley Butler did, and he had already written the classic 'War is a Racket.' In terms of cinema, the Marx Bros 'Duck Soup' and Chaplin's 'The Great Dictator' are much more articulate regarding the subject of war and peace. Actually, 'The Shape of Things to Come' is also better on the subject as well.

This film is mostly just a curiosity. It's eerie that it predicted the USA entering into a European war in 1940, and it's eerie that it showed an attack on NYC, it's got funky video-telephones for futuristic 1940, and it's got a hint of pre-code sex. But it's slow, talkative, and in the end fakes you out because you think the point of view is pro-peace, but in the end, it's just more cheer-leading for the War Machine. Like we need that.

War, as a topic, isn't easy, nor should it be. Any writer who treats it easily is just lazy and disingenuous. War is even more difficult when talked about. It's one thing to show soldiers fighting, because then there's not much to think about. Soldiers are going to fight for their country, their comrades, and their own lives. Showing battles is probably the easiest thing to do. But war as a hotly debated topic is a totally different thing. It's polarizing and takes care to capture the nuances and intricacies of both sides.

That's where "Men Must Fight" failed.

Just look at the title. If understood one way, it could mean that men are innately geared towards fighting and that it's a character flaw in men. Understood another way it could mean that it is a duty that they should proudly do. "Men Must Fight" was aiming at the second meaning, not the first.

Fighting and war was a point of debate in the Seward household. Laura Seward (Diana Wynyard) was absolutely opposed to war in all cases. She was a battlefield nurse and saw too many young men mutilated and killed. Worse yet, she saw her lover and her unborn son's father killed in war. That helped solidify her position on war.

Laura's husband, Edward Seward (Lewis Stone), was an ex-military man and Secretary of State. He married Laura after her baby's father died and raised Laura's son Bob (Phillips Holmes) as his own. When it came time for the U. S. to enter into war with Eurasia he felt it his patriotic duty to support a U. S. offensive.

Bob, Laura's son, was firmly planted on the side of peace though his convictions were being assaulted. First, his fiance Peggy Chase (Ruth Selwyn) broke up with him over it. She told him that he must not love her if he'd choose his ideals over her.

I thought that was utterly stupid. I don't even think the writers realized what a vapid character they'd created. If people gave up their convictions for some man or woman they loved then they wouldn't be convictions would they? What if she said I can't believe you're choosing God over me? That would be something everyone would recognize as a stupid and selfish statement. A person's beliefs are what makes them them. Would you even want a person who drops their convictions and beliefs to appease someone they love?

For Bob's part he answered her effectively. He essentially said that he would eventually resent her if he put aside his convictions for her sake.

The second thing to test Bob's convictions was his own father--or the man who raised him and who he believed was his father. Edward Seward, Bob's guardian I'll say, was upset that his wife and son wouldn't see things his way. He was angry that they would keep talking about peace during a time of war (when the hell else do you talk about peace?). He was particularly galled that Bob contradicted him to a reporter. Edward told the reporter that his own son would aid the country during war. Bob chimed in and told the reporter that his father can't speak for him on a matter so serious as this. It was his decision to make and it was to not join the war effort.

In Edward's anger he told his son that he is no son of his. He told him that his father died in a plane crash and he is not fit to carry the Seward name.

It was a low blow. It was mean and ruthless. Edward practically begged to marry Laura (Diana Wynyard) knowing her stance on war. She was a peace advocate for years and he was as well, but the moment their convictions were tested he balked. Not only did he balk, he couldn't handle his wife continuing to hang on to her beliefs.

All of it together weakened Bob and he decided to join the war over his mother's protestations.

In the end the message of this movie was lame. Men must fight and women must produce fighters. It is such a simple and idiotic message. As if war and fighting can be stripped down to people operating upon their base nature. As if we don't have brains for logic, reasoning, conversing, and compromising. Nope. That's for when times are good, but when times are rough we must fall back onto our animal side: men fight, women support men who fight. I'm not even what you would call anti-war, but the case for fighting that this movie made was plain dumb. Come back when you have something deeper, with more angles, and more dimensions. You can miss me with the one-dimensional grade school stuff.

Free on DailyMotion.

During the 1930s, quite a few antiwar films were made. Considering how wasteful and unnecessary WWI was, it's no surprise that these films flourished. The problem, however, is that while the films were absolutely right about the pointlessness of wars like the First World War, they also didn't take into account that there sometimes are wars that need fighting. After all, Hitler was truly evil.

While many of these idealistic films are true classics (such as ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT, J'ACCUSE (the remake), GRANDE ILLUSION, WESTFRONT 1918), some, like MEN MUST FIGHT are not. Now it is very thought-provoking and unique--and it certainly gets points for that. Unfortunately, the film also comes off as a bit preachy, morally ambivalent as well as quite dated. But it does try.

The film begins with a nurse (Diana Wynyard) and a pilot (Robert Young) having a tryst in a rented room (after all, this is a Pre-Code film--where the moral values of the late 30s and into the 40s were NOT at all evident in many Hollywood films). Unfortunately, he is soon killed and she is pregnant. Nice guy Lewis Stone marries her knowing this and she vows to raise the child as a pacifist.

For a while, Stone seems happy raising this boy this way. After all, he becomes Secretary of State and his role is as a peacemaker. Unfortunately, though, when war threatens with the fictional country of Eurasia, he joins lockstep in the American war effort and expects this pacifist son to do the same. Well, the son doesn't and the mother spends much of the film heading a national pacifist movement. Naturally, this leads to conflict and chaos within the family.

The problem is that the film was awfully hard to believe sci-fi. While it was cool watching everyone talking on videophones in the future year 1940, the film doesn't seem to make a good case for pacifism or going to war. Perhaps if the acting had been a bit better and less earnest AND the film not been so morally ambiguous it would have succeeded. Instead, you have no idea why the war occurs, who is at fault, what is at stake or the events leading to this conflict. As a result, it's quite watchable but also not a necessary film to watch.

Copyright 20 February 1933 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Distributing Corp. New York opening at the Capitol: 10 March 1933. U.S. release: 19 February 1933. 8 reels. 73 minutes.

SYNOPSIS: The scene is set in the USA, seven years into the future, namely 1940: A pacifist Secretary of State (Lewis Stone) comes to realize that America has no alternative but to repel an invasion with force, to trade an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. His wife (Diana Wynyard), however, does not refute her pacifist sentiments even when the enemy carries out a sudden, surprise air attack against New York, destroying several famous landmarks including the Brooklyn Bridge and the Empire State Building. NOTES: The stage play opened on Broadway at the Lyceum on 14 October 1932, but closed after only 32 performances. Arthur Sircom directed Gilbert Emery, Janet Beecher, Douglas Montgomery, Erin O'Brien-Moore, Alma Kruger, Kent Smith and Edgar Barrier.

Ruth Selwyn is director Selwyn's wife.

COMMENT: A muddled pacifist stage play, very theatrically over-emoted by Miss Wynyard (fortunately her ham acting has not infected the rest of the cast, though Phillips Holmes comes close to breaking out on a number of occasions), and somewhat over-contrived in its plotting and staging.

Nonetheless, the film is of enormous interest not only as one of the few overtly "message" pictures produced by M-G-M, but for its prophetic view of 1940 (which can now be transferred to 11 September 2001) with America involved in a war against Germany and Japan. (Japan is actually identified as the aggressor in the 1932 play but in the movie, the hostile country is called "Eurasia").

The enemy launches a sudden, surprise air attack against New York, destroying several famous landmarks including the Brooklyn Bridge and the Empire State Building (which is bombed as was the World Trade Center towers by striking the building twenty or so floors from the top so that the structure topples in upon itself). Another odd twist of "prophecy" has hero Holmes flying away to a hero's death. He was actually killed in a mid-air collision in 1942 whilst serving in that same United States Air Force. The movie correctly foretells the widespread use of television, but falls short in its depiction of present-day telephones.

However, the main thrust of the movie lies not in science-fiction gadgetry, but in the "message". And, as often happens when a plot is twisted to accommodate spurious philosophy, consistency of characterization flies out the window. True, Diana Wynyard's role is always relentlessly motivated towards "peace at all costs", but Lewis Stone's undergoes two remarkable reversals which no amount of skilful acting can disguise. Philips Holmes also has to contend with a part of similar instability, but lacks Stone's experience in camouflage.

An equally serious defect in the play's construction lies in May Robson's contribution. Her comic relief - especially in the confrontation scene between herself, her loyal butler (Greig) and comically true-to-Eurasia cook (Alberni) - seems mistimed and inappropriate. Ruth Selwyn is a pretty girl, though her attractiveness is marred by a couple of ghastly Adrian costumes.

'Men Must Fight' is one of the most astonishing and audacious films I've ever seen. This 1933 drama boldly predicted a second world war (in 1940!) at a time when many Americans were actively planning to sit out such an event. This film depicts an aerial attack upon Manhattan, in a sequence that seems startlingly precognitive for viewers watching after the 9/11 WTC attack. Even more bizarrely, this movie prefigures the real-life deaths of two of the leading actors in its cast.

Diana Wynyard stars as Laura Mattson, a Red Cross nurse in the Great War. She has a brief fling with a handsome aviator who then conveniently dies. Rising diplomat Edward Seward (the excellent Lewis Stone) realises that Laura is pregnant by the pilot but unmarried; he proposes to her and offers to raise the child as his own son. Laura doesn't love Seward, but knows this is the best option for herself and her child.

Lap-dissolve to the future year 1940 ... seven years *after* this movie was released. There is some astonishing art direction here, with the female characters wearing slightly Jetson-ised fashions, and picturephones in every home. Seward's fortunes have risen, and he's now the Secretary of State. Laura has raised her son Bob to adulthood whilst allowing him to believe that Seward is his biological father. Meanwhile, a foreign alliance called the Eurasian States are gearing up for war against America.

Having seen the toll of war, Laura organises a women's pacifist league to prevent World War Two. In a 'Lysistrata' gambit, she persuades the mothers of America to refuse to donate their sons to the juggernaut of war. The film's title has an unspoken counterpoint: men must fight ... and women must make peace. Bob joins his mother in her pacifist campaign. This proves an embarrassment for Secretary of State Seward, especially when a mob of protesters show up to fling stones at his house while haranguing Laura and Bob as 'yellow-bellies'.

SPOILERS COMING. Eventually, the Eurasian States' warplanes attack New York City, destroying the brand-new Empire State Building and other landmarks. The special effects in this sequence are marginally better than in 'Deluge' (another film of this period in which Manhattan was destroyed). Despite the technical flaws, for post-9/11 audiences these scenes are absolutely riveting, and it's impossible to sit through this sequence without being reminded of Osama bin Laden's terrorist attack.

Eventually, Bob learns that his actual father was a war hero. This and the assault on Manhattan are enough to persuade him to change his ways. He joins the army and becomes a fighter pilot, willing to die to keep America free. War is inevitable, and therefore men MUST fight.

'Men Must Fight' sets out to be unnerving, and succeeds. Yet it's more unnerving than it meant to be, due to its distressing precognition. The assault on Manhattan eerily prefigures the events of 2001. Even eerier are the real-life fates of this film's two lead male actors. During the sequence in which hooligans stone the house of Lewis Stone's character, I recalled how Lewis Stone would die 20 years after this film was made: some boys threw stones at his house, and he dropped dead of a heart attack in the street while chasing them. (Way back in 1920, in the silent film 'Milestones', Lewis Stone played yet another character whose house is stoned by hooligans!) Even more unnerving is the ending of 'Men Must Fight', in which Bob Seward (Phillips Holmes) renounces his pacifist ways to become an aviator. In real life, Holmes gave up his movie career early in WW2 to join the Canadian Air Force as a fighter pilot, and he died during a flight exercise. The spectre of Holmes's real-life death hangs over his fictional character in this film, giving it a powerful undertone of morbidity. I usually dislike Phillips Holmes, who tended to play neurasthenic weaklings. His role in 'Men Must Fight' forces me to recall that this actor died a hero's death in real life, and that he should be remembered accordingly.

'Men Must Fight' is an astonishing and audacious near-future drama, made even more powerful by the real-world events which have overtaken it. I'll rate this movie 10 out of 10. God bless America and keep her people safe.

An historic note that I haven't seen in any post about this brilliant film: Film Secretary of State Edward Seward is analogous to real US SoS William Jennings Bryan.

In the movie, the fictional Seward gives up his pacifist beliefs because a US envoy has been assassinated in "Eurasia," and American pride demands that we send the fleet to provoke war.

In real life pacifist WJ Bryan refused to give in to war hysteria before WW I. When President Woodrow Wilson threatened Germany over the sinking of "neutral" ships (carrying war materiel?), Bryan resigned in protest, Soon after, Wilson got Congress to declare war on Germany.

Bryan's wife was a collaborator on his political ideals. "Seward's" film wife tried, but did not succeed because her husband yielded to the hysteria that national pride seemed to demand. (I will only mention the name Benghazi to illustrate whether modern countries feel the killing of an ambassador is a cause for war.)