A Woman Rebels (1936)

Too much of everything

A different way of telling a story

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

"A Woman Rebels" was a big money loser when it debuted. I think much of it was because it was a very strongly feminist film...even by 1936's standards...and most folks weren't ready to see a movie with such modern sensibilities...especially the notion of a single woman having a baby.The movie is set during the mid-late Victorian era. Pamela (Katharine Hepburn) and her sister Flora have a father (Donald Crisp) who is extremely cold, detached and loveless. He also is angry because Pamela wants more out of life than was typical of a woman of the day. She wants to read, educate herself and be something other than just a dutiful wife...and he is determined to marry her off like her sister. However, Pamela falls for a rogue and soon finds herself pregnant. To hide this, she goes to stay with Flora...and when Flora's husband dies as does Flora, Pamela pretends that her new baby is her sister's. She also does the unthinkable...she gets a job and eventually becomes a very modern and emancipated lady.This is a very well made film but as I said the notion of a single mother must have not sat well with folks. Worth seeing and among the actress's better early films.

I think this RKO melodrama distills Hepburn's strengths in her early years even better than in her celebrated performance of Jo March in "Little Women". Kate was not the kind of actress who could play common or weak (although she was common but strong in the under-appreciated "Spitfire"). During this period, she mostly played strong and independent characters."A Woman Rebels" is a very good story about a Victorian woman who dares to be independent at a time when women were expected to get married. A career was considered out of the question. I think it's very well written and directed with good performances, especially from Herbert Marshall and Van Heflin (in his debut film performance).

This is a classic "chick flick". A real old-fashioned tear jerker.Quite good Hepburn, actually. A perfect part for her- it encompasses all the complex and varied facets of her screen persona. Its surprising this movie didn't do better at the box office. Too political or controversial for 1930's audiences? Herbert Marshall as the love interest is excellent as well.Although the film deals with a variety of women's issues- discrimination in the workplace for one, the real subject is the shame of having a child out of wedlock. It is hard for modern audiences to appreciate how much stigma was attached to this as recently as 40 years ago. Three lives are profoundly affected by the need to keep this secret.One negative: the actress who played Hepburn's daughter was a disappointment. Too old and lacking the grace and beauty of Hepburn herself. Just goes to show how rare true star quality is.

The sins of the father shall be visited upon his children, and upon his children's children. Katharine Hepburn plays a woman who was a bright, curious child whose father stymied that curiosity because she was "just a girl". Later in life, Hepburn's illegitimate daughter, whom she raises as her niece, is a bright, curious child, whose curiosity Hepburn stymies whenever said curiosity would reveal her illegitimacy. There's wonderful hypocrisy at work in Hepburn's character, but the film absolutely fails in addressing the issue. Very disappointing.Also infuriating is the handling of the character of the father, who is strict and regimented at the beginning of the film and is reduced to being a near-weeping milksop, comforted by and comforting his loving daughter, near the end. Where was he during the raising of his granddaughter? Were I Hepburn, I wouldn't let him near her, but if that's the case, how did they become reconciled by the end? It makes no sense.