Bright Leaf (1950)

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

It's 1894. Brant Royle (Gary Cooper) has returned to Kingsmont seeking revenge. His late father's tobacco business was destroyed by Maj. James Singleton (Donald Crisp). Brant encounters Margaret Jane Singleton (Patricia Neal). Margaret mischievously stirs up trouble with her protective father leading a confrontation with Brant. Connecticut Yankee John Barton is in town trying to sell his plans for a cigarette-making machine. Brant doesn't have the money but with his former lover madam Sonia Kovac (Lauren Bacall), he hopes to make the machine to drive Singleton out of business. This is a nice love triangle. They have good conflicts which heat up their relationships. Cooper's nice guy persona allows his revenge to be sweetened. Otherwise, this could have been too bitter for the general public. It allows one to stay with him even as he is corrupted by greed and power. He takes a dark turn and it's great. This is a tragedy of epic Grecian nature. Brant's ending is poetic. The ending for Malley and Sonia should be that they join up with Barton starting up an automobile company in Detroit. Also, Neal and Bacall may be better off switching their roles. Bacall is a perfect femme fatale and Neal is naturally grounded. It's a bit of against type casting. Overall, this is solid tragedy done well.

A turn of the Century twist with another Cooper, O'Neal romance. NOT!!! Don't let that stop you at the Gates of the Singleton Plantation. Gary Cooper,(Brandt Royle) the last of his families line,a wannabee businessman meets Northerner Mr. Barton with a cigarette rolling machine that could make them millions. Enter Bordello owner Sonia, (Lauren Bacall) who has feelings for Mr. Royle. Royle needs money to start up his cigarette business but Sonia knows all to well that she's being used as his love interest. This movie is not about the money or the success that it brings. This movie shows how old fashioned ways, traditions and family hatred get in the way of just about everything. Cooper does a fine job of transforming from a humble upstart to a drunken self absorbed entrepreneur. In my opinion Lauren Bacall could have played Patricia Neal's role but the casting dept had other ideas. The supporting cast does a fine job of holding the story together. Donald Crisp as the irascible old school Tobacco King and Jack Carson who starts out a down on his luck charlatan running a medicine show at the beginning of the story into a well polished boardroom businessman at movie's end. Does this movie teach us to love our superficial business world or should we search for our true passions instead? This question haunts the masses for centuries and this movie may or may not give us the answers but you will be entertained by an all star cast.

I think that Warner Brothers liked the performance that Gary Cooper gave in Edna Ferber's Saratoga Trunk which was released under their auspices a few years earlier. So when Cooper signs with Warner Brothers, Bright Leaf which is about the tobacco industry which has an Ferber like quality to it seemed perfect for him.It didn't turn out that unfortunately. Brant Royle may be the most unsympathetic character Gary Cooper who was THE archetypal screen hero ever played. He's come back to his home which is in a valley in the tobacco growing country of North Carolina looking for vengeance on Donald Crisp the tobacco baron who ruined his father. All he has as the family heir is a closed factory. But when Crisp refuses to take an interest in Jeff Corey's new cigarette rolling machine, Cooper latches on to Corey and with medicine show doctor Jack Carson to sell the product, the three form a partnership.Lauren Bacall who runs the town's house of joy with Gladys George helps kick start the firm with a financial investment. She likes Cooper well enough, but he's got eyes on Patricia Neal who is Crisp's daughter. Neal is a southern to the manor born heiress like Bette Davis in Jezebel and Vivien Leigh in Gone With The Wind. Those are high maintenance women and Cooper finds out just how high maintenance she is before the film concludes.Though this is a Gary Cooper film, the female co-stars really steal this film from the men. Neal and Bacall are whom you watch and remember from Bright Leaf and of course Gladys George who is never bad in anything.Though Bright Leaf is about a typical Edna Ferber empire builder the ending is anything like what you would find in a Ferber novel. Bright Leaf is a bit too melodramatic for my taste, but fans of the stars should find it good.

I've seen this movie 5-6 times on the late night movies. I think its one of the very best I've ever seen. I hope to find a copy to purchase. Older movies don't compare to late movies, and I don't expect them to, but I like the older ones best. Cooper was mid career here, the other actors and actresses were well known and for some of them, this was not the character parts their fans typically expected them to play. As a result, the critics of the time, and today, don't give it the best of ratings. I gave it top ratings for content and depiction of the relationships and involvements and heartbreaks between a man torn between two women, business, and what is right.