The Late George Apley (1947) User Reviews (25)

A relaxing, charming comedy

[Whythorne · 8/10 · 6 January 2009]

Sadly, a lot of modern film watchers can't appreciate a comedy like this that isn't over-the-top, ribald, or in your face. "The Late George Apley" is a refreshing throwback from a long-gone era when subtlety in a comedy and understated performances like Ronald Colman's were more valued and appreciated. Thank heavens there are networks like TCM where you can catch some of these forgotten gems from time to time.

Don't pay attention to reviewers who claim "nothing happens" in this movie, although I imagine those with attention deficit disorder may have trouble with a film like this. For everyone else, there is plenty going on beside the humor, including a lot of charm as well as some surprising depth and unpredictability in the various characters.

Subtle yet entertaining.

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 22 June 2009]

This is a different sort of Ronald Colman movie. In an odd move, he plays the central character in the film but is also a very flawed man--not the sort of likable guy you'd expect him to be. This was quite a risk, though with this film and A DOUBLE LIFE (both 1947), Colman took on some darker characters. Now I am not saying that Colman is evil in THE LATE GEORGE APLEY, but he certainly is as far from the guy you'd see him play in THE PRISONER OF ZENDA or LOST HORIZON as you could get!

Colman plays George Apley--the head of a distinguished but way too self-important family of quality in Boston circa 1912. He is the blue-bloodest blue blood in town and a man completely wrapped up in traditions. And, according to traditions, his two grown children should marry within their ranks--and not for love but for family honor. The problem is that the son does not want to marry the cousin who was always designated to be his wife and the daughter is in love with a Yale man (uggh, for shame that he didn't go to Harvard!). So the heart of the story is will Apley get with the times or will he remain stuck and duty-boud forever? Fortunately, his brother-in-law (Percy Waram) was there to gently nudge George in the right direction and although Waram is NOT a well-known actor, his smaller role was probably the most interesting and pivotal in the film. He easily upstaged other supporting actors in the film such as Richard Haydn and Midred Natwick.

The film is funny, but in a very, very subtle way. If you are looking for belly laughs, this is not your film. However, it is a nice film about social satire and it is well made form start to finish as well as very different---something I value considering how many films I have watched over the years. Well worth seeing.

Long Season's Journey ...

[writers_reign · 8/10 · 3 December 2007]

Gene O'Neill set what is arguably his greatest play, Long Day's Journey Into Night, on a day in 1912 in New England. Here we have a piece also set in 1912 and also in New England but Massachussetts rather than Connecticut and the time-span is a tad longer, around six months. That apart the two couldn't be more different and are poles rather than miles apart for where O'Neill doesn't shirk from mild profanity, drug addiction and alcoholism, George P. Marquand's characters balk at a preference for cigarettes rather than cigars. Marquand was a great social historian who was to Boston was Edith Wharton and Louis McNeice were to New York and John O'Hara was to Pennsylvania and Mank, in his third film behind the camera, has caught the nuances perfectly, realizing that the trick is to encourage the actors to speak what to even an audience in 1947 were preposterous lines (I have to use a word I've never had occasion to use in front of you in all our married lives ... sex') with completely straight faces. Although perhaps not recommended on a regular basis a film like this, celebrating as it does, the art of graceful acting complementing gracious living, is a genuine delight as a contrast to modern fare and though Mank had still to find his voice he had proved himself fully capable of segueing from historical/Gothic romance (Dragonwyck) through noir (Somewhere In The Night) to the comedy of manners. Ronald Coleman could hardly be bettered as the eponymous character and the support is excellent. Recommended.

A descendant of the Puritans is forced to deal with "this modern age"

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 2 June 2013]

I doubt this film could have been pulled off without Ronald Colman in the title role as a descendant of the prominent Apley family of Boston. His entire life is taken up with people of similar background, and he considers anything outside of the Back Bay of Boston to be a foreign country. The film is set in the years prior to WWI and horse drawn forms of transportation are still the norm. He believes in his own form of noblesse oblige, and is very satisfied with his ways of giving back to the community - Tuesday Night Club on Tuesday, Wednesday Night Club on Wednesday - need I say more?

In this rarefied museum piece of a life, George's children are about to turn everything upside down. His daughter is in love with a Harvard professor - so far so good - who is a Yale man! And the young man is teaching that Emerson is a rebel! Even worse, his son is in love with a young lady from Worcester whose father is president of a tool and die works! "A foreigner" as George himself says. To top things off a flashing electric sign advertising Grapenuts has been put within sight of his front door.

Like I said before, if the part of George was played by anybody else but the dapper and charming Colman, this guy would probably come across as insufferable. As it turns out, George really has a generous soul, a point that is driven home by Colman's portrayal, but his point of view is crowded with traditions that are centuries old whose origin he doesn't really understand himself, and to step away from them - or to see any member of his family step away from them - leads to a sense of discomfort that makes him feel that he perceives a wrong that must be righted.

I'll let you watch and see how this all works out, but it really is a delightful comedy of manners with real heart and delightful character actors in the supporting roles. Highly recommended.

A Boston patriarch in 1912 finds times they are a-changin'

[blanche-2 · 7/10 · 7 January 2009]

Ronald Colman is "The Late George Apley" in this 1947 film based on a Philip Barry play, also starring Richard Ney, Peggy Cummins, Edna Best, Richard Haydn, Vanessa Brown, and Mildred Natwick. Apley is a stuffed shirt whose well-ordered family is suddenly not so well-ordered. His son (Richard Ney) is dating a girl from Worcester, which is seen by Apley as being someplace like the Black Hole of Calcutta, and his daughter (Cummins) loves a Yale man who lectures that Emerson was a radical. At first, George takes a firm stand, then relents at the behest of his understanding friend, who saw George give up the woman he loved 30 years earlier. When the Worcester girl's father actually rejects the Apley family, George rethinks his position. His daughter is sent to Europe to get away from her boyfriend, and his son is betrothed to his cousin (Brown).

Imagine going to Broadway shows in the '20s and '30s and attending one class-conscious play after another. Before the Depression, the sets were drawing rooms, the clothing was formal, everyone had British accents, and the plots had to do with the crossing of the classes. Frankly, I'm glad they finally intermingled.

Ronald Colman is marvelous as George, and one sees his confusion, pain, and remembrance of the past on his face. He's a very sympathetic character. Peggy Cummins is very pretty and Richard Ney is nice-looking. Vanessa Brown, as the dowdy cousin, gives a sweet performance, and her story arc is very satisfying.

If you're a fan of Ronald Colman, as I am, this is a good movie to see. Also, if you know Boston at all, you'll find hearing the street names interesting. Otherwise, it's a mildly interesting period piece that most people will find relating to difficult.

It's all Colman's flick...and Colman is Colman!

[vincentlynch-moonoi · 7/10 · 2 February 2013]

This is fine film-making for those who understand what that means. One of our reviewers said the film was "stuffy", while another said the film was "dated". Uh...yes...the film is a satire about stuffy, dated Bostonians. Unless you "get" that, then naturally you're not going to enjoy the film. And, perhaps it's just not your kind of film.

But let's face it, the primary attraction here is not the story (although it's a rather interesting one of how an old Bostonian finds he has to change). The primary attraction is Ronald Colman. Perhaps the most suave, sophisticated, and respectable actor who ever lived. And make no mistake, Colman is playing Colman and Apley.

I don't agree with some of our reviewers who describe this as a comedy. It's actually rather difficult to place it in either camp -- comedy or drama. It's really a mix, although I think the emphasis is on drama. And, just when you think you know exactly where the film is going...well, let's put it this way -- there are some surprises in the form of plot twists.

Supporting Colman are Richard Haydn, who I've become rather bored with as he almost always played the same snob. Richard Ney is Colman's on. I particularly enjoyed Percy Waram as Colman's brother-in-law; I was not at all familiar with him, but he was quite good. Mildred Natwick played Mildred Natwich and Colman's forceful sister. Edna Best played Colman's wife, and had a couple of very strong scenes. Peggy Cummins played the daughter.

Recommended, and it found a place on my DVD shelf.

"Emerson Had Something Capital To Say On It"

[bkoganbing · 9/10 · 5 January 2009]

The Late George Apley provides Ronald Colman in one of the best roles of his career as the proper Bostonian George Apley in those pre-World War I years. It's funny, but even then Boston had slipped away from the grasp of his kind. Those immigrants, starting with the ones from Ireland had been running the government there for about a generation when this play on which the film is based is set. But don't tell that to George, his kind if they don't outrightly rule, they do set the standards of proper conduct for America. When the Apleys gather for Thanksgiving, they're most mindful of the fact that some of their ancestors originated it.

But even Colman and his insular Boston world can't escape generational problems. Both his son Richard Ney and his daughter Peggy Cummins are having problems with their respective choices as life partners, especially Cummins who wants to marry a man who graduated from of all places, Yale.

Colman, maybe the most civilized leading man ever in screen history captures the essence of the decent, but somewhat fatuous George Apley. A man who thinks all the answers to life's problems can be found in a volume of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Even Emerson didn't think that.

The Late George Apley is based on a Pulitzer Prize winning novel by John P. Marquand who also collaborated with George S. Kaufman on the play. Their creation ran for 384 performances in the 1944-45 season and starred Leo G. Carroll and Janet Beecher on stage. Edna Best takes Beecher's role on screen as the patient wife of Colman.

Some really fine players populate the cast. Richard Haydn plays his usual fuss budget busybody of a cousin, always eager to help Colman maintain the high Apley standards. Mildred Natwick is Colman's even snootier sister and Percy Waram who was the only player to repeat his role from the stage plays her patient husband who talks to Colman like a Dutch uncle, not a brother-in-law.

The Late George Apley is a good American answer to those British comedy of manners even though a lot of this cast is of British origin. Would we had someone of the wit of George S. Kaufman today to write them and an actor with elegant prose of Ronald Colman to speak the lines.

The sort of gentle satire no longer in vogue...

[Doylenf · 8 October 2004]

THE LATE GEORGE APLEY is the sort of comedy of manners that audiences could appreciate in the '40s and '50s before more explosive entertainment took center stage. It's performed with great charm and skill by a talented cast--and especially by Ronald Colman (in the sort of stuffy role he was born to play) and by the charming British actress Peggy Cummins. Viewing her here, one can understand why Zanuck found her unsuitable to play Amber St. Claire in FOREVER AMBER--charming but immature in stature and looks.

The cast seems to be relishing their roles in this tale of Boston bluebloods striving to uphold the family's social status. Vanessa Brown and Richard Ney, unfortunately, are the least appealing aspects of the supporting cast in rather colorless roles. Richard Haydn shines, as he always does in these sort of things.

Only fans of Ronald Colman can truly appreciate this sort of period piece. It flows smoothly but with little ventilation seeping into the musty households and other interiors and seems more like a stage play soon to be seen on Masterpiece Theatre.

The Bostonians

[richardchatten · 6/10 · 28 January 2022]

Rather obviously based on a play. The central character - unfortunately not dead, as the title suggests - is a snob and a bore whose charm resides solely in the fact that he's played by Ronald Colman; although his amusement rather than shock at the book by Freud he discovers in his daughter's possession is rather endearing.

Much better than I expected.

[GoodScents · 9/10 · 28 March 2009]

I watched this last night. I'd never even heard of it before so read the reviews here, which led me to expect it to be slightly dull but worth watching because of Ronald Coleman.

I didn't expect it to be so funny! Within the first ten minutes I was laughing out loud and I found it funny, sweet and charming all the way through.

The humor is very subtle, almost what I would call "British" humor, wry, sly and dry. The opposite of slapstick. Such great actors who can convey so much with a pause, a glance, wonderful to watch.

The movie is 60 years old, takes place nearly 100 years ago and thousands of miles away from where I live but I know people who are exactly like that. Which is probably why I found it so funny.

Perhaps the ending is a bit predictable but there were some nice plot twists in getting there. A quiet movie, yes, but not at all dull. I would definitely watch it again.

There are dinosaurs among us...

[samhill5215 · 6/10 · 12 January 2009]

I watched this film because of Ronald Colman, an excellent actor in my humble opinion. But within the first twenty minutes or so I became overwhelmed by a feeling of incredulity that people such as those on the screen actually existed. Glum, self-satisfied, living in the past, calcified, incapable of novel thought, etc, etc... And then I remembered why I sat to watch the film and I must say Colman did not disappoint. He was as usual thoroughly enjoyable. So on that level the film succeeds. But it also succeeded in reminding me that such as the Apleys exist among us today. True, they are more modern in their speech and dress but no different in their attitudes and prejudices. If for no other reason it is worth seeing as a social commentary and a reminder that there are dinosaurs among us!

Loads of subtle comedy - LOVED IT!!

[bbronisz · 9/10 · 5 May 2009]

what a treat - what a delight! i'd never heard of this movie, but hung in for the opening scenes and was hooked within 20 minutes - so much subtle comedy, i found myself waiting for and wanting more laughs and was always rewarded with clever, witty lines, especially from the brother-in-law.

Ronald Coleman is picture perfect as the father and you can literally see the times a'changing before their eyes and catch the change in the children. you might think that the story is a bit predictable, but it has surprising plot turns. an unexpected gem - those here who trash this movie just don't understand classic and good cinema!

Delightful

[jmazznyc · 7/10 · 7 September 2019]

I thoroughly enjoyed this film. But after reading the other IMDb reviews, including the original NYTimes review, I now realize that the next book on my list will be Marquand's Pulitzer Prize winning novel. Apparently that will foment a proper perspective of this viewing.

It's interesting how films based on books or plays are judged. "Jaws" being one of the most successful adaptations, going back to the 1930s-40s will be quite a trip.

The Late George Apley- Film Should Have Departed As Well **

[edwagreen · 4/10 · 14 March 2007]

In the same year that he won the Academy Award for the great "A Double Life," Ronald Colman starred in this colossal stuffy bomb about an idealistic Boston family of 1912. They're a wealthy bunch although the film never tells us where they got their money from.

Colman was an outstanding actor and he is able to rise above the boring film and give a splendid performance as a man devoted to his social mores of the time. The problem is that he is about to wreck the lives of his son and daughter by his obstinate ways. In reality, he is nothing more than a snob who quotes Ralph Waldo Emerson to justify his ways.

You know that he will eventually come to his senses but you don't care as this film just moves along at a dull pace.

As his sister, Mildred Natwick (Amelia) has some funny lines but that's about it.

You would think that being born in Boston to wealth meant that you remained there for good and acted in an outlandish way.

It is only when The Bird Society denies him the presidency, Apley begins to come to his senses. This film is certainly for the birds. This might have worked in 19th century Europe but forget it here.

The Late George Apley

[CinemaSerf · 7/10 · 24 July 2023]

The "Apley" family have been part of the Bostonian establishment since God was a boy, and the head of the household "George" (Ronald Colman) is keen to ensure that with his wife "Catherine" (Edna Best) his son and daughter follow firmly in their establishment footsteps. Thing is, his daughter "Eleanor" (Peggy Cummins) and his son "Richard" (Richard Ney) are rather more independently spirited than that, and their definition of conformity is not quite that of their father! What now ensues is a rather nicely paced comedy that offers us the principle of coming of age - but in this case it's the grown ups who have to come to an age in which their traditions are important, but not all-so. It's based on John Marquand's original, quite satirical, story that casts gentle aspersions on snobbery and elitism, but also acknowledges some of the values those eschewed as a bedrock for a solid and decently evolving society. Colman is on good form in a role I imagined might have suited George Arliss too, and there is the always reliable Mildred Natwick amongst a supporting cast of the sympathetic and not so amongst this family that simply has to adapt to survive. This is an enjoyable ninety minutes of social observation and is well worth a watch.

The End of the Boston Brahmin World According to Mr. Marquand

[theowinthrop · 10/10 · 5 January 2009]

John Marquand is another of those authors who were once incredibly popular who now are barely recalled - and sometimes to our loss. If England gave us James Hilton and Joyce Carey, and France the Catholic novelist Georges Bernanos, the U.S. had (among others) John P. Marquand, who was a chronicler of the rich and powerful and prominent, particularly in his native New England (and especially Boston). His novels were frequently made into movies: B.F.'s DAUGHTER, H.M.PULHAM, ESQ., TOP SECRET AFFAIR. His best novel (which won the Pulitzer Prize) was THE LATE GEORGE APLEY. This lovely movie is based on part of the novel.

As mentioned in other of the reviews here, George Apley (Ronald Colman) is a proper Boston Brahmin, home on Beacon Hill, conservative, polished, and gracious. He represents centuries of grand breeding by his Massachusetts ancestors. Occasionally a comment will break through the hard lacquered surface of the Apley household. When he has invited the father of a girl his son is infatuated with (but who lives...horror of horrors...in Worcester, Mass.)for lunch, the girl's father (Paul Harvey) reveals that Apley's great grandfather was involved in the notorious "triangle trade" (the subject of the song sung by John Cullum in 1776). Apley is a trifle thrown by that old fact being revealed (and by a social inferior at that!).

It is 1912 or so, and there is (despite one's inherent feelings that poor George is hopelessly reactionary) a lovely aged sheen of nostalgia on the film. We see people in a quieter and gentler America, having coming out parties and planning to eat a nice dinner at Delmonicos on a visit to New York City. There is also snowball fights near Boston Common. It would not be amiss to run this film with MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS and THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSOMS for an evening of good films dealing with the turn of the century (one can add HEAVEN CAN WAIT to the group too).

But the winds of change are tearing at the fabric of the world of Mr. Apley. He has two children (Richard Ney and Peggy Cummings) who while brought up properly (we later learn that shortly after Ney was born, Colman and his brother-in-law Percy Waram went to sign up the baby for a future class at Groton, the posh private school that leads to Harvard) are now being rebellious. Cummings is romancing a young professor who is lecturing at Harvard (Charles Russell), and Ney (who is supposed to be engaged to his cousin (Vanessa Brown - her father is Richard Haydn) is running around with the girl in Worcester.

Things get into a bad state, as Colman's Apley tries to come to grips with the breaking up of his orderly world of clubs and superiority. I don't think Colman ever played such a placid snob as well in any other film he made. To his credit Apley tries (at times) to meet his children half way, egged on by brother-in-law Ralph (Waram), but at other times he finds his efforts explode and sides with the more reactionary Horatio (Haydn). It becomes a fight to see whether the better side of Colman will triumph over his conservatism. But there is hope - he does find he likes to read Freud.

Boston society is far from dead today. But 1912 was about the last year that the old comic song about "where the Lodges only speak to the Cabots, and the Cabots only speak to God!" was really true. At the time the Senator from Massachusetts was Henry Cabot Lodge Sr. (whose grandson would also be Senator one day). But it was slowly dissolving, first by the onslaughts of Irish into Boston (mentioned several times in the film), and then the other immigrant groups. In the 1920s the Sacco-Vanzetti Case would show the cleavages between the old social elite (represented by the bigoted trial judge and the President of Harvard) and the defendants (two Italian-born anarchists). By the 1930s we have entered the age of Mayor John Michael Curley (the model for Frank Skeffington in THE LAST HURRAH), and the grip of the old guard never totally recovered. It is no accident that the best known "wealthy/socially prominent" family in Massachusetts today are the Kennedys, who built their ways up from the teens of the last century: the date this movie is set in.

Colman and his fellow players make us admire the form and position that old guard once controlled so well. But we welcome the fresh air that blew it all away.

Victorian Traditions at Boston MA

[viswanat-1 · 9/10 · 12 May 2009]

Ronald Coleman has a resemblance to Errol Flynn but far exceeds him in gentility,suavity and urbanity. His voice is mellifluous and unlike any male actor of his time, even to this day.His portrayal of George Apley is really entertaining and very realistic as anyone would know by reading novels written at the time about Boston "brahmins". The character he plays is the quintessential Boston blue blood. He could portray outrage in a controlled manner expected of the character of George Apley and also profound sadness at the discovery of the drawbacks of Bostonian upbringing.The humor in the whole story is also genteel and yet manages to make some in the audience laugh out loud. I did as I watched this gem of a movie. This movie is a treat to watch for those who view a movie in all its dimensions. His character eclipses all the rest in the story including that portrayed by the great Mildred Natwick.

Lovely way to spend your time.

[teaandoranges · 10/10 · 26 March 2009]

I came upon this movie tonight on TCM, I started to watch it because I am from Massachusetts and heard mention of the Boston Public Garden, which for those of you not familiar with it is a lovely iron gated park in the middle of Boston, it looks much like it looked in the movie even today. What a lovely movie, well acted, especially as man others have mentioned Ronald Colman. But the chap who played his brother in law was wonderfuland the poor fellow having to put up with his old crow of awife. I guess that's why he was the one to remind George of how real love feels (because he did not have it). And the talk they had where they said they went to sign the baby up for future classes at Groton....we pass by Groton frequently and its is as austere and beautiful as it must have been back in 1912..I recommend this movie to anyone who wishes they could find a funny, clever, enjoyable movie that they wouldn't be embarrassed to watch with their children. I was surprised to hear the "triangle" mentioned as the way the family got their money (another poster said there was no mention of how they got their money) but it was from the rum-slave triangle.Can't remember what the middle was. Anyway I liked the movie and would watch it again.

Flat

[richard-1787 · 4/10 · 6 January 2009]

I found this a flat movie. Bob Osborne compared it to Life with Father, and that brought out the differences. In the latter, William Powell exaggerated "Father's" character to make it funny. In Apley, Ronald Coleman brings a humanity and understatedness to George Aply that, while perhaps more "realistic," undermined any possible humor. The same was true of most of the other performances. They were all well-acted - Coleman was always a fine actor - but if these characters aren't exaggerated, they aren't funny. And since they aren't interesting, that left them just flat and mildly boring.

Which describes the script.

I haven't read the novel. Perhaps it's funny. This movie was not.

Boston isn't just a city. It's a state of mind.

[mark.waltz · 8/10 · 20 August 2013]

Life with father Ronald Colman must be a blast. Who else can sing the praises of seeing a yellow bellied sap-sucker in November? If this doesn't get him the presidency of the bird watcher's club, then there is no justice. O.K., so there's more to this version of the novel and play than that. It's about coming to terms with the changing of times, no matter how it rocks the cradle of everybody around you. Colman must loosen a button or two on that stuffed shirt of his, and it is very amusing watching him do it.

Richard Ney, the British son in Mrs Miniver, switches nationalities, even if, according to Hollywood, there's little difference where Boston and the London suburbs are concerned. Colman's suave personality add subtlety to his character's snobbery with equally nuanced performances by Richard Haydn and Mildred Natwick as other family members. Director Joseph Mankiewitz gives the film excellent pacing, making sure that every detail is exquisite. Had Colman not given his Oscar winning performance the same year in A Double Life, he certainly would have been considered for this.

Veteran actress Edna Best is quietly noble as the wife, less involved than mother in Life With Father and certainly not as passive aggressive. Peggy Cummins is innocently feisty as the quietly increasing suffragette daughter. Vanessa Brown is sweetly insecure as Haydn's daughter, seemingly forced to marry cousin Ney in a plot development that seems oddly incestuous. While the Boston of this era disappeared with high button shoes, it is a sweet reminder of the age of manners which didn't quite hide the class system but also made fun of the phoniness.

Well acted but irrelevant

[TallPineTree · 6 January 2007]

I enjoyed the acting and felt the actors did an excellent job in roles that were written for them to illustrate an aspect of the story's theme.

The main theme was to illustrate how provincial, snobbish, and useless rich Bostonians were in the early 1900s. Okay... how is that relevant to me almost 100 years later? When the movie was over I thought, "Who cares?"

Other story aspects are dated. For example, the poet Emerson. He was used as an example how Bostonian attitudes had calcified. He was treated with reverence by Bostonians and considered a rebel by a non-Bostonian. That much I got as the movie said as much, but not being familiar with Emerson's history, this didn't resonate with me though I think the story expected me to know more about Emerson. The movie did not encourage me to learn more about Emerson.

Another example of how dated this movie is in its mention of Freud. Freud's theories today are generally discredited and ignored and the movie treats them, and his mention of s-e-x, as titillating and important. But remember the movie probably came out before the Kinsey Report.

Boston Sleep Party

[Lejink · 5/10 · 17 August 2020]

A forties Hollywood film notable for being one of the last acting appearances by reliable leading man Ronald Colman and one of the earliest directing assignments for future Oscar-winning director Joseph L Mankiewicz. It's a bit of a shame then that neither is really stretched much in what almost amounts to an American drawing-room comedy, based, pretty obviously as it turns out, on a play from the late 30's,

Colman is the title-named stuffed-shirt current patriarch of a dynastic, turn-of-the-century Bostonian family comprising his, if not quite long-suffering, certainly long-enduring wife, a mildly reactionary son groomed in his own image and set to be thrust into a loveless marriage with the plain but adoring daughter of another of the Boston set and a pretty, wholly-rebellious daughter representing modernity with her talk of Freud and attitude towards sex. It's certainly mildly shocking, in the context of the film, when she drops the word "virginity" into polite conversation amongst the family gentry and again later when Colman similarly starts a discussion about sex with his wife.

Unfortunately, the film doesn't really kick on from these ear-catching moments and blandly moves towards a not entirely satisfactory conclusion where one sibling seems to get what they want, although only after having to endure a six-month European exile with her aunt, Mildred Natwick, the epitome of starchiness, while the other is forced to conform to the status quo even if their new spouse does at least by then seem to have found their backbone and taken something of a lead in directing events. Hardly progressive stuff then, and you're left at the end thinking that Apley's conversion is neither far from conclusive or convincing. There's a little bit of social commentary in the ether too, especially when "old-money" Apley meets the new-money self-made businessman father of the real love of Apley junior, but there was never much chance of the twain meeting in this duo's closed-minds encounter.

Overall, I found the movie pretty dull and uninspiring viewing with little to really commend it. The action is static and set-bound and the mise-en-scene and dialogue weren't remotely inspired enough to compensate for the film's other deficiencies. In support, Peggy Cummins adds a spark of life as daughter Ellie, Percy Waram is fine as the sage conscience of the film in the guise of Natwick's very much long-suffering husband and Edna Best is solid as Colman's crutch, his devoted but blindly-so wife Catherine. As for Mankiewicz and Colman let's just say that one had better things ahead of him and one had better days behind him.

An attack on traditional upper class values for radicals to applaud

[hollywoodlegend · 2/10 · 9 February 2014]

George Apley is the head of an upper-class Boston family and a man true to Victorian values and behavior. Fans of Ronald Colman's voice are treated to an almost excessive amount of it in the beginning as his character is established. He quotes Emerson and seems truly delighted to have seen a certain bird so late in the year. You get to hear him say "sap-sucker" repeatedly. He feels his privilege comes with certain duties, and those must come before all else. The story opens on Thanksgiving Day, so we meet the extended family. Here is where things turn ugly. His two adult children have both decided to rebel against the path their father feels is right. The daughter has taken up with a young lecturer from New York who calls Emerson a radical, much to George Apley's horror, and smokes cigarettes instead of cigars. Suddenly his daughter is talking about Freud and badmouthing coming out parties. The son has long been expected to marry a certain cousin, but now he is lying to his father that he has to study. Instead, he's off to see a new girlfriend from the wrong side of the tracks.

At this point, I expected the father to reel his children in. However, the story goes against George Apley and all that he stands for. His close friend and his wife both tell tales of George's own younger days concerning love, marriage, and the role his father had played in his son's actions. Suddenly George does a 180. He has a whole different outlook. He even sneakily reads his daughter's Freud book. Here's your chance to hear the Ronald Colman voice spout the word "sex" multiple times.

Is George Apley abandoning his inherited sense of what's proper for his family so that his children can pursue romantic love? Or is this a portrayal of upper class Victorian values being mocked and shattered for the writer's own satisfaction? At one point, another character claims the Apley fortune came from the triangular trade of rum, slaves, and molasses. Although this film is from the 40s, its condemnation of George Apley's values seem to reflect fully modern disdain for the past.

The viewer is left to see how long George's 180 turn will last and to what extent. How much will he compromise and capitulate? Will the son and daughter marry their romantic loves or respect their father's Apley family Bostonian traditions?

I know I am in a small minority, but I found the film insulting and distasteful. I thought it was like watching a classy older man be pushed into the gutter by a gang of young punks. Ronald Colman is always wonderful, but the scathing attack the original writer was making on the upper class of Boston seems very ugly on the screen.

Spoilt Turkey

[vostf · 2/10 · 23 August 2004]

This dud is devoid of any interesting point. Downright boring. With the opening minutes everything's clear: the Apleys are dull Boston socialites -1900s style- and they are content with it. Would you sustain these insignificant beings for a 90 minute? I did and I regret it. I watched at The Late George Apley, so vain, and nothing happens.

Well forget Mankiewicz directed it. You know, All about Eve reaches the top of the ladder but that one should never have risen from the mud.