Review of A Free Soul (1931) by Elliott F — 19 Jul 2012

Lionel Barrymore won a much deserved Oscar for Best Actor as an alcoholic lawyer in this melodrama. It's a 1930s melodrama, so there's not a whole lot good that can be said of the screenplay, except that the way it handles alcoholism is remarkably ahead of its time.

The acting is uniformly terrific, however, which is somewhat surprising for such an early talkie (Barrymore's great and really deserved the Oscar, but Norma Shearer, Clark Gable, and Leslie Howard are all great as well), and the cast holds the film above water.

If only for the acting and the alcoholic subplot, it holds up much better than most movies from the era.