Blossoms in the Dust [VHS]

Blossoms in the Dust [VHS]
by Mervyn LeRoy

Blossoms in the Dust [VHS]

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Category: VHS Video
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Product details

Actor: Fay Holden, Felix Bressart, Greer Garson, Marsha Hunt, Walter Pidgeon
Director: Mervyn LeRoy
Cinematographer: Karl Freund
Producer: Mervyn LeRoy
Producer: Irving Asher
Writer: Anita Loos
Writer: Dorothy Yost
Writer: Hugo Butler
Writer: Ralph Wheelwright
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Original Language), Analog
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
Running Time: 99 minutes
Release Date: 1993-12-23
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Publisher: MGM (Warner)
Studio: MGM (Warner)

VHS Movie Reviews of Blossoms in the Dust [VHS]

Movie Review: Love this movie
Summary: 5 Stars

I love old movies, This is definitely a good one. My husband and I are adopting and our adoption agency suggested we watch this. It really gives you insight to how adoption was once viewed. I am so glad I bought/watched this. And I am so glad that adoption has changed to what it is today! Please adopt a child!

Movie Review: Mandatory movie for adoption professionals and anyone touched by adoption
Summary: 5 Stars

Having worked for 28 years in child placement, and having created www.opendoption.org in 1996, I have seen and heard of a lot of adoption history. I have heard thousands of adoption stories. All of them are touched by the experiences described for the first time in a major movie in 1941 with Blossoms in the Dust. It is a true classic!

Yes, there is a tremendous variety of adoption stories. Some may see "Blossoms in the Dust" and find it's relation of some adoption experiences as unrealistic compared to the ones they had. I am certain they are right. I am also just as certain that there are some touched by adoption that had experiences very similar to those in this classic. Adoption stores are as varied and different as is the human race. This movie hits the basics very well. To have been this sensitive and creative in 1941 was a powerful achievement.

For adoption practice in 2009 this movie has powerful messages: Birth mothers never forget is probably the most central, and the damage done by secrets kept from the adoptee is probably the second most critical one present.

If you are touched by adoption you owe it to everyone you know to get a copy of this classic and then invite the ones closest to you to watch it with you some quiet evening at home. Warn them that this movie is, as of 2009, 67 years old! They need to remember that as they work to translate the related experiences. It is worth the effort.

Movie Review: How about releasing this on DVD????
Summary: 5 Stars

Or better yet, having a Greer Garson DVD set with this, Mrs. Parkington, Valley of Decision, Julia Misbehaves and The Miniver Story.

Movie Review: Blossoms in need of Dusting
Summary: 3 Stars

I become a pretty big fan of Greer Garson over the last few years. I expected to be impressed with her role in "Blossoms in the Dust" as well as with the movie itself. I hate to admit it but I thought that this was a mediocre movie and I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt by giving it a rating of "3 stars". The problem with the movie is that everything is designed to make the most impact in the least amount of time. I don't believe I ever saw a movie where each and every scene was designed to either educate, shock, enrage, or endear. I realize that motion pictures are about taking a 400 page book and turning it into a 110 minute film. In order to be so concise, every scene needs to be, by necessity, elemental to the overall film. However, great movies lure us into the emotions it wants to create in us. Great movies give us the sense that we have been swayed by our own abilities to see through the surface to the hidden meaning within. Great movies don't create a cast made up of saints and demons with few falling in between. Great movies don't shove us from scene to scene. This is not a great movie.

There are some fairly decent aspects to its' credit. I still like the acting of Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon. The color and cinematography are excellent. It's just too much of an emotional roller coaster; not for me but for the cast. There's a sister who handles sudden dispair in an extreme manner in less than a minute. There's our heroine who one minute can't stand kids and the next (alright, that's a bit of an exaggeration on my part) can't stand to be without them. There are loving parents to be and an occassional coniving parent that was. There are all kinds of different kids including some who are illegitimate; a term that is never really dealt with. I sympasize with the cause of deleting illegitimacy from birth records. This was, perhaps, the biggest issue that our heroine, Edna Kahly Gladney, took on. I saw a birth certificate the other day from that era. There was no father's name on it and the recorder made sure to put a "Miss" in front of the mother's name. Other birth records of the same version in that era just showed names without titles. I'm glad she took it on the cause of eliminating such designations as "illegitimate" on children's birth certificates. I'm just sorry that the picture only managed about 5 minutes in which to fit the issue into the movie.

"Blossoms in the Dust" ought to be a real tear-jerker and a quick review of some other reviews shows that it was for many viewers. However, there was never enough time spent establishing an emotional attachment to give real feelings to a subsequent detachment. A scene towards the end gives us an Edna that is ready to flee everything in the middle of the night, sacrificing all she's built from the ground up. The reason was clear but not clearly convincing. Two minutes later all is well. I had learned long before that scene not to invest my emotions in any particular part of this movie. After all, it was obvious that neither the writer nor director had done so either.

Movie Review: A Woman's Film
Summary: 3 Stars

Blossoms in the Dust is a true story about a woman who helps to rid the world of the shame of being an illegitimate child. Through her own tragedies such as the suicide of her adopted sister who had no last name and the death of her own baby, she triumphed to help many children in need. She made it so that women who worked and could not care for their children during the day could keep them instead of giving them up for adoption. She also ran a successful orphanage.

Greer Garson stars in this film, a plain, standard version of a good woman. There is nothing outstanding about her personality.

There are several points in this film that the acting seems forced such as during long periods of laughter and during times of play. These artificial scenes hinder the film.

This film was written by Anita Loos, a notorious scandalous film writer of the 1920s. It is surprising to see that she also did family dramas.

The big disappointment about this film is that nothing really seems to happen. If you read the back of the box, you know what is going to happen and you watch it simply come to life. However, the story is not exciting enough to really make much of an impact. This is old news. Perhaps for audiences that well knew the conditions of life for illegitimate children before this woman took a stand, it would be more powerful today.

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