Her Sister's Secret (1946) User Reviews

good melodrama

[blanche-2 · 7/10 · 2 August 2015]

We know from people like Bobby Darin and Jack Nicholson that, with the stigma of having an illegitimate child once so prevalent, the person you call "Mommy" might not be. Your real mother could in reality be your sister, your aunt, anybody.

In "Her Sister's Secret" from 1946, director Edgar Ulmer keeps this film out of maudlin territory and presents a poignant story of a mother's pain at having to give up her baby for her sister to raise.

Nancy Coleman stars as Toni, a young woman who meets a soldier, Dick (Philip Reed) during the New Orleans Mardi Gras. They fall in love, and he wants to marry her. They decide to wait until his next leave to be sure. When they part, they agree to meet, if they both feel the same, at a restaurant. Unbeknownst to her, his leave is canceled. He writes to her at the restaurant but the letter never reaches her. By then, she is pregnant.

Toni finally confides in her sister Renee (Margaret Lindsay). She and her husband (Regis Toomey) have not been able to have a child, so she offers to raise the baby as their own. Toni agrees, but in her heart, she never really gives up the baby. After her father dies, she starts literally stalking the child and his nurse, sitting in the park each day. Truly alone now, she makes a decision that is going to cause problems.

One can't help watching a film today and realizing how different things were when the film was made. Can you imagine someone sitting in a park each day, watching children, and a nurse handing you a kid and asking you to watch him for a minute? Like I suppose that happens. She would have been picked up by the police the minute someone notices she's there every day. We live in a much different society now.

Also, having an illegitimate child was tantamount to being a criminal, so bad you had to disappear, return later with someone else having taken your baby, or say you were married and your husband died, or end up in a home for unwed mothers. Nowadays people take out headlines announcing an unmarried pregnancy. Amazing.

Anyway, Toni is in terrible pain, and one can't help but feel for not only her, but all the women who went through that situation years ago. In Toni's case, because she believed Dick didn't love her, she could not get past losing the baby, Billy, too.

The Mardi Gras scenes are marvelous, showing the festivities and people's enjoyment.

The acting is very good, with Nancy Coleman giving a lovely performance as a heartbroken woman, and Margaret Lindsay as her sophisticated older sister. Philip Reed, who at some angles bears an eerie resemblance to Tyrone Power, is fine as the soldier who leaves without realizing he's going to be a father. Regis Toomey plays Lindsay's husband, and he comes off as a genuinely nice guy and a good man.

How wonderful that the little boy who played Billy, Winston Severn, has posted here with his reminiscences of the film. Though he was only four at the time, his memories are strong.

I really liked this film. The actors pulled me in, and it was well directed. Not the world's greatest production company, but it pulled off a winner.

Sin during Mardi Gras leads to heartache

[jjodo32 · 7/10 · 27 November 2003]

I found this a very touching film, perhaps because I too spent leave in New Orleans during Mardi Gras. However, in my case my loneliness was not assuaged by a tryst with a lovely young woman who gave me access to all the best New Orleans had to offer during wartime. In keeping with conventions of the day the woman is punished for her sin when, not having heard from her lover who has returned to duty, she gives up her baby to her married sister. Although somewhat dated & melodramatic the film works on many levels. I particularly liked the evocation of the New Orleans social scene during Mardi Gras, something I missed when I was there.

It's an Ulmer film, but it's no Detour...solid dramatic stuff from the mainstream

[secondtake · 7/10 · 19 November 2014]

Her Sister's Secret (1946)

An enchanting double-entendre title, and a slightly forced but still effective melodrama. The time is intense—World War II—and the desperation of lonely men and women leads to the crux of the plot, a child born out of wedlock.

This only happens after some decent character development, mainly between the man, a charming average fellow played by Phillip Reed, and the woman, who is the main character, Toni, played by a charming Nancy Coleman. Neither actor is well known, and you might make a case for their plainness here. Both are convincingly normal people—not the glowing stars that live in someone else's universe.

Because these regular folk are facing a pretty common problem, though one that was hushed up or swept up at the time, at least amidst the upper middle classes depicted here. The large twist is the immediate solution to the problem, a believable convenience in wartime. It leads to emotional conflicts and some heartwrenching decisions, and eventually to a crisis involving really good and well-meaning people.

Such is a melodrama.

The filming is typical amazing 1940s Hollywood, dramatic and silky. Cameraman Franz Planar has a huge resume of quite good but not stellar films, but I've seen a number of them recently and am impressed by a steady professional richness to them all (I'm thinking of "Bad for Each Other," an odd but beautiful Charlton Heston vehicle). This visual sense helps hold the film up as it rises and falls through the streets of Mardi Gras to house interiors. It's all rather enjoyable if never quite riveting and demanding.

This movie might be forgettable if not for the cult favorite director, Edgar Ulmer. And it truly is his panache that lifts a B-movie to something worth watching. It lacks the dazzle of his famous movies like "The Black Cat," but it still has a slightly daring social twist for the time. Give it a go on a quiet night when you can get absorbed.

An Ulmer Film Well Worth a Look

[lonboris · 26 October 2014]

In his TCM intro, Robert Osborne correctly draws attention to this film's focus on a child born out of wedlock as its subject area. One wonders to what extent Ulmer, already comfortable at and most likely the "ace" at PRC, was intrigued by the challenge of flying under the radar of the still-in-force Code. The opening section is purposefully, almost archly, romantic; one has no idea of the situation to come, and it is only alluded to throughout the first half of the film. The title itself veils the true emotional core, the unwed mother's conflict, which reveals itself gradually as the film unfolds. It's well into its second half before her emotional plight becomes fully apparent. Guided by Ulmer, the film veers from high romance to the borders of Ed Wood Land – not quite as far afield as Glen or Glenda, but it does have something of the flavor of the "public education" films that were four-walled from the 30's onwards.

This may not be Ulmer's best film – I would place The Black Cat, Detour, Ruthless, and to a lesser extent Carnegie Hall in that category. But his skill and talent as a director are evident throughout. The film is fluid with camera moves, never extraneous to its content. Especially in the second half, certain lighting-dictated moods are often quite striking, and the physical motions of the performers occasionally demonstrate the rhythmic pacing that Ulmer's late wife Shirley and daughter Ariane have cited as one of the hallmarks of his direction. As in Ruthless, it is classical style applied to dark content. The result is a tone as fevered as any to be found in Ulmer's work.

The child actor does fine. His actions and reactions work to support the purpose of, and at times enhance, every scene. To criticize the performance of a child so young (three years old), as is done by another reviewer, is ludicrous.

This one really pulls you into the story...

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 7 June 2017]

Toni (Nancy Coleman) is at Mardi Gras and meets a soldier named Dick (Phillip Reed) and they impetuously fall for each other and they have sex*. She gets pregnant and they lose contact. Not wanting to be an unwed mother, she convinces her sister (Margaret Lindsay) to adopt the child and pretend it is hers. Renee agrees but stipulates that Toni needs to stay away for at least three years, as she's worried Toni might change her mind and try to take the baby back to raise on her own. Some time passes...and Toni's commitment to the agreement begins to wane...

Although there are a few overly dramatic and overwrought scenes, this is a good story and it really packs great emotional impact...particularly when Toni decides to go back on their agreement. You'll find yourself getting angry, sad...the whole gamut. Well worth seeing.

*Sex in the 1940s was pretty much taboo in films, so here the camera pans to the sky and the music intones and then the sun rises...hardly a love scene but about as far as censors back then would let them go.

A boy, a girl, a war... it's not original but it's still entertaining!

[khunkrumark · 6/10 · 28 July 2017]

A melodrama that fits in perfectly with its place in the historic time it was set and nowhere else. If a man was walking out with a gal in 1946 immediately after the second world war, he may well have made taking her to this movie a part of his courtship!

Nancy Coleman (looking shockingly like Judy Garland) and Margaret Lindsay play sisters with problems... Renee can't have children and Antoinette inadvertently gets pregnant!

These days it's easy to be confused about why the people in this movie do what they do... but up until the 1970s being a 'child out of wedlock' was not something anyone would willingly own up to and being unwed parents was something approaching a criminal offence!

Anyway, this movie opens up in New Orleans and the Mardi Gras celebrations. The balcony celebrations of the 1940s are nothing like the bawdy carryings on of today! But people still had lots of fun and let their emotions get the better of them... so, Toni meets Dick and they, well, they let their emotions get the better of them... and Toni ends up preggers.

Dick gets called up to fight the good fight and after some miscommunication, he simply disappears from the scene. The cad, right?

Anyway, the baby is born and secretly adopted by Renee in New Orleans and Toni promises to keep the whole thing a secret and scarpers off to a new life in New York.

"There's nothing that we should ever regret in life except not having lived it!

That's Toni's dying father's last piece of good advice to his unhappy daughter. Now she is so consumed with her own mistake that she gets on a train to New Orleans and secretly sees young Billy from a distance in the local park. After a few weeks of stalking her own son, it gets a little bit creepy and at one point Toni even thinks of picking the child up and running off with him.

Dick shows up in New York and visits Renee in her apartment where all the pieces fall into place. The final fifteen minutes are great melodrama and of course everything, thankfully, ties up neatly!

Well, it is what it is but despite the delicate subject matter, it comes across as good drama and is still worth a watch. There is a terrible version of this on YouTube and unfortunately, I don't know of a better one.

As usual, there are plenty of interesting stories attached to the other players in this movie... Louise Curry plays the stunning, nameless girlfriend of Dick early in the movie. After tiring of the acting game in the mid-1950s, she turned her hand to decorating houses and died aged 100!

Fritz Feld provides comedy relief as a wine salesman. If there's a maitre'd, waiter or chef in a movie it's probably this fellow! There are many more...

I found it watchable but it is old, it is dated and the themes that it tackles certainly don't apply these days.

An excellent film...I enjoyed being a small part of it!

[wsevern · 10/10 · 23 July 2006]

I really enjoyed playing the part of Billy Gordon in this film. Although I was less than 4 years old, I have vivid memories of the entire process of making this film. The studio lights in those days were very bright & hot, causing the ladies' makeup to run after a short time. The big camera used for close-ups looked like a giant eye which made me quite nervous. I didn't like the tractor being used to move the props around...A tractor belonged outside in my opinion...My 3 year old little mind thought of it like a mechanical Tyrannosaurus Rex with big hind wheels and small front wheels...Quite a scary dinosaur! I remember that the entire cast & crew were so kind to me on & off the screen. My Dad, Mom, brothers & sisters were very encouraging & worked hard to tutor me...Lots of rehearsals were done at home, so that there would be no mistakes on the set. There are relatives and friends who are interested in purchasing this movie...Do you know if it is available on DVD?

Apologies to Robert Osborne, but this is a bad movie.

[tsmith417 · 4/10 · 23 October 2014]

This film was shown on TCM the other night and before it started there was Robert Osborne, lauding the talents of the director and saying what a great movie it was.

I don't know what Mr. Osborne uses as his criteria for a great movie, but it sure ain't the same as mine.

The acting was wooden. Everyone just stood there and spoke their lines at each other, not necessarily to each other. I've seen more emotion displayed by a marionette.

The editing was choppy. In one scene the girl and boy are riding in a hansom cab and they're seated one way, in the next frame they've switched places, and then they go back to the first way.

The sound quality was poor.

I apologize to the reviewer who said he was so happy to have played the part of the child, but he was not that good and seemed to not even know what was going on most of the time he was on-screen.

The story is an old one: an unmarried girl gets pregnant the first time she has sex, the father of the child disappears from her life so she goes away for 9 months and her sister/friend/mother tells everyone the child is hers, and the girl spends the rest of her life regretting her decision.

The story was done much better by Bette Davis in both "The Old Maid" (where she plays the unwed mother) and "The Great Lie" (where she plays the one who adopts the child as her own).

Don't listen to Robert Osborne and don't waste your time on this mess of a movie.

A well-crafted film

[jeffreynothing · 8/10 · 24 February 2001]

I saw this film at a screening several years ago at the Edinburgh Film Festival. The picture was actually introduced by Mr.Ulmer's daughter. It's a typical 1940's melodrama that is well directed. It is apparent in viewing the film that Ulmer knew exactly what he was doing when he made a movie. It was only the second Ulmer film I had seen, the first being the superior Detour. I can't remember the plot in too much detail because it was a while ago, but it involves an illegitimate child. It has a good social message in that it sheds light on how so-called "bastard" children are sometimes the subjects of social discrimination. I'm surprised it hasn't received more votes. I guess I was lucky to catch that screening.

Sets were awesome, acting so-so, costumes expensively hideous

[bjkpma · 5/10 · 7 June 2017]

I stumbled upon this film last night, thinking it would be fun to see another take on how women had to find socially acceptable means of having a child out of wedlock. Other great actresses have played these roles -- Ginger Rogers, Barbara Stanwyck, Bette Davis -- and they deliver wonderful performances. Not in this film, where the leads are just one-dimensional even when expressing conflicting emotions. The sets were lavish -- fanciful confections of style and so over-sized as to convey the opulence and grandeur of the privileged class of the sister heroines.

The most memorable aspect of the film were the sumptuous yet hideous gowns and coats worn by the stars. Reminded me of Carol Burnett's spoof of Gone with the Wind where she has a gown made from the velvet draperies, and leaves the drapery rod in. Perhaps it was the juxtaposition of these angular, geometric, over-sized costumes against the backdrop of the Architectural Digest style sets made them even more laughable.

Mr. Ulmer in the Douglas Sirk mode.

[BrentCarleton · 8/10 · 29 June 2009]

It is nothing if not puzzling, that despite all the attention Mr. Ulmer's other work receives, "Her Sister's Secret," remains consigned to some no man's land--ignored, ignored, ignored...

Very bewildering indeed, since, Mr. Ulmer is clearly working above his usual constraints, as is evidenced by the fact that it doesn't look like a PRC film at all! By some feat or other, a bit more coin was dropped here and it shows.

Working this time without his usual collaborators, (or should we say culprits?) producer Leon Fromkess and art director Paul Palmentola) Ulmer achieves something completely unlike the pulp antics of "Monsoon" or "Delinguent Daughters,"--a posh women's picture in the Douglas Sirk mode--all velvet and satin and ball masques.

Indeed, the film looks for all the world like one of Ross Hunter's early black and white dramas for Universal--(before he ascended into Eastmancolor heaven)-such are the film's physical and aural accoutrements, (among the latter note the use of a celestial choir in the fadeout just as in 1959's "Imitation of Life").

To avoid "spoilers" suffice it to say that the story hinges on a well born young miss who finds herself in trouble after an indiscretion with a furloughed soldier during Mardi Gras. Though Miss Coleman's character mentions her extreme "shame," the picture avoids the moral implications of her dilemma in favor of the unavoidable emotional attachment she feels toward her child.

To the picture's credit it strongly emphasizes the permanent natural and ethical link that maternity imposes, (this would be an excellent film for pro-abortionists to see.)

That the principal players are Phillip Reed, soulfully beautiful Nancy Coleman, and tres chic Margaret Lindsay assures the audience of three very good looking leads. In addition it offers veteran player Henry Stephenson a good part preparatory to his trek to Albion in order to film David Lean's "Oliver Twist," (didn't Ulmer rub shoulders with interesting people?)

Though bereft of Eugene Shufftan's fabled expertise on this project, Mr. Ulmer was lucky to secure the services of Franz Planer, a superb cinematographer in his own right, who manages deftly smooth boom maneuvers amidst the moody settings (the work of art director Edward Jewell). This is most evident in the film's superb opening, in which Mr. Planer rides his camera through the flying confetti and contorted, gyrating and swaying movement of the masqued revelries of the Mardi Gras, (this film anticipates, on a smaller scale, the carnival sequence in "Saraband for Dead Lovers").

The settings include the terraced New Orleans restaurant where the film opens, Mr. Stephenson's private library, an Arizona Sanitorium, Central Park and Miss Lindsay's swank Manhatten duplex apartment, which seems to take some of its stylistic cues from Premingers "Laura," (all white on white satin with the requisite terrace.)

And being a women's picture a nod must go to "Donn" who provided the Misses Coleman and Lindsay with a mouth watering wardrobe, which serves as a reminder at what a dear sartorial cost the cultural meltdown of recent decades has wrought--one won't find on screen elegance like this today. Why the milliner alone must have made a killing on this picture! And take a gander at that satin lined split sleeve number Miss Lindsay wears in her final scene.

All told, this is a smoothly turned and consistently interesting treatment of a perennial problem--and deserves a far higher place on the list of Mr. Ulmer's credentials than "Jive Junction".

My Foolish Heart without Death ***1/2

[edwagreen · 9/10 · 25 October 2014]

The typical movie but nicely about a woman who takes her unmarried sister's child as her own when the latter becomes pregnant after a one night fling with a soldier. Of course, the letter he sent her to explain that his leave had been canceled goes astray.

Nancy Coleman as the unmarried lady and Margaret Lindsay, as the sister, play their roles to the hilt. We have guilt, promises broken and an adorable little boy.

The atmosphere of the film is a good one as it begins at Mardi Gras time in New Orleans.

When I first saw the film and what was taking place, I thought I was headed to the tear-jerker, "My Foolish Heart." Yes, the sisters may have been foolish in what they decided to do, but don't we do things as a sacrifice to children? The story ends on that note.

PRC Manages a Success

[dougdoepke · 26 April 2015]

Plot-- A pregnant young woman is left with responsibilities when her soldier lover is abruptly sent overseas during WWII. So she looks to her married sister for help. All of which leads to unforeseen complications.

PRC was infamous for its bottom-of-the- barrel dreck, so why take a chance on one of its productions. All in all, this movie's a good reason why. No, the 1946 flick's not going to be confused with a glossy Ross Hunter soaper from the prosperous 50's. Still, this 90-minutes is well-mounted, well-acted, and intelligently handled. That opening Mardi Gras scene is a grabber, conveying a real sense of joyous abandon. Clearly, PRC popped bigger bucks to back director Ulmer, while Ulmer responds with style and restraint. I particularly like the way the couple's intimate night is conveyed. First there's Toni and Dick in a romantic upspiral, then Ulmer cuts to a romantic shot of the night sky, and finally he inserts a gloriously lit daybreak. The result is a tricky topic finessed via cinematic art.

Then too, a topic like unwed mothers and lost love could easily descend into overload. But not here. The movie manages its touching parts without getting sappy. Plus, the principals (Coleman, Lindsey, and Reed) calibrate without over-emoting despite the heavy material. I expect the topic of tangled relationships really registered with uprooted wartime audiences. Looks too, like the story's moral says a lot about there being more to parents than just biology, even if the point takes a while to work out. I guess my only gripe is with the heavenly choir ending, which really does pile it on. Anyway, this skillful production shows that even lowly PRC could manage a respectable result when it really tried.

admirable portrayal of the situation

[RanchoTuVu · 8/10 · 20 April 2015]

World War II era Mardi Gras in New Orleans complete with confetti, parades, and streamers, where the well-heeled daughter of a scholar on the Mayas meets and has an "indiscretion" with a soldier about to be shipped out to fight in the war. The real drama comes after the baby arrives and the meaning of the film's title becomes clearer, as the older sister of the young woman convinces her that she and her (the sister's) husband could raise the baby as their own and everyone would believe they were the baby's biological parents. The story moves from New Orleans to New York with a stop at a ranch in Arizona, the young sister (Nancy Coleman) finds the emotional attachment to her baby is stronger than she expected and forces the older sister to hold her to her promise, which is the angle that really motivates the movie.

Good Ulmer.

[matthewwave-1 · 25 October 2014]

I just finished watching the film (thanx, DVR) and, unlike one earlier reviewer, I don't recall Robert Osborne saying it was a great film. Tho he did praise Ulmer in general. But I readily admit my memory of the introduction might not be perfect; I just don't remember him calling it a great film.

It's not a great film. But it is a good one. Despite what yet another reviewer said about the budget, it's definitely a B-movie, probably shot very quickly -- just probably with a bigger budget than some B's, and definitely well-crafted enough to look terrific. Stylishly shot for the most part, the best-looking part is, of course, that marvelously fluid Mardi Gras first act. I was really impressed by how expansive and lively Ulmer, Planck and company could make their inexpensive, studio-bound Mardi Gras.

Still, yes, this is a B, and there are some rough edges. A few blown edits does not a bad film make. Almost all of Ulmer's films, almost all B-movies, have flaws. Often, definitely often in Ulmer's case, they don't negate the strengths of the films -- in this case, smooth, confident direction and cinematography and, for 1946 at least, a *relatively* sensitive and intelligent approach to the subject matter -- more on that later. (It would probably take longer to recite a list of Detour's flaws than to watch the film -- and none of them matter in the slightest; Detour is a great film.)

And the major performance were all quite good, altho I will say that Stephenson took top honors -- something not surprising from the great character actor.

It's funny, reading the negative comments about Winston Severn as young Billy, because enjoying his adorable moppetedness in the film really got me thinking about child actors. Some are remarkable (Ann Carter in Curse of the Cat People, Anna Torrent in Spirit of the Beehive, Nicholas Gledhill in Careful, He Might Hear You, to name just three), but, to a certain extent, at least, extremely young actors, like Severn in this picture, are sorta bad-performance-proof.

He played a three-year-old. He acted like a three-year-old. No, the "performance" wasn't smooth or "professional", but it was utterly real and engaging. No, it's true, he didn't always seem to know what he was doing -- just like many three-year-olds don't always look like they know what they're doing in real life. Would a better-trained (likely, older) kid who hit marks precisely and enunciated every line smoothly have necessarily been better for the film? I don't think so. Severn's utter kid-ness made Billy a hugely sympathetic character. I thought he was a striking plus for the film.

The plot and script bow to filmmaking formulae of the times, and some of the character motivations and the plot developments that come out of them strain to work, but Ulmer and his talented actors handle them pretty well. For me, the hardest part of the film to live with was the very end -- with people other than poor Reid's character apparently getting to decide that he will never be allowed to know he even has a son! Holy keee-rap, that's cruel. But not unexpected from films of the time. As was pointed out, there are even better films of the era that dealt with similar themes (giving up one's child -- sometimes illegitimate,sometimes from a dead or supposed-dead spouse), and they, too, often featured parents and/or children who were conscioulsy denied by others the truth of their relations to each other. It sticks in my craw with those films, too.

Matthew