With hundreds of really superb Columbia movies just begging for a DVD release while they gather dust in the vaults, it's odd that Sony would resurrect a film as disappointing as She Wouldn't Say Yes (1945). True, the storyline seems to be based on a clever idea, and there's no doubt that producer Virginia Van Upp has assembled a great cast: Rosalind Russell, Adele Jergens, Percy Kilbride, Harry Davenport, Charles Winninger, Sara Haden, etc. But alas, Miss Russell's co-star is the amorphous Lee Bowman. Mr Bowman is the sort of leading man that you wish would get caught in an elevator between the 18th and 19th floor somewhere, and spend the rest of the movie there! And the writer here, alas, is producer, Virginia Van Upp. Now I'm all in favor of women getting greater opportunities in Hollywood, and Miss Van Upp certainly did a better job with Gilda (1946), but her writing here is so strained that right at the end of the movie an off-screen announcer suddenly comes on to repudiate all of Percy Kilbride's footage! I've never seen or heard anything like this happen before or since in my whole life! And in any case, Percy Kilbride's scenes are easily the best in the movie, not just because of the way they're written, but because of the winning way in which Kilbride plays them. I wish I could say the same about the rest of the cast. Bowman is a complete write-off, but everyone else tries hard – too hard in the cases of Rosalind Russell, Harry Davenport and Lewis Russell. It's super-glamorous Adele Jergens who walks away with the female acting honors. She's also far more attractively photographed and dressed than Roz, who often seems quite dowdy.
Review of She Wouldn't Say Yes
