I'm not really a Joan Bennett fan, but I checked out
Wild Girl and
Big Brown Eyes on The Criterion Channel.
Wild Girl, IMO, is a creaky western that, unintentionally, plays like a comedy. The script (based on a
story by
Bret Harte), tone, and performances -- particularly the performance by
Eugene Pallette -- have the broad, histrionic quality of a 19th century "boo the villain, cheer the hero" stage melodrama. The cast introduces themselves, in character, and the costuming and makeup on
Ralph Bellamy, for me, evoked
Snidely Whiplash, even though Bellamy's character is not a dastard. Notable among the supporting cast: child actress
Marilyn Harris, immortal as "Maria, the flower that didn't float" in
Frankenstein, released several months before
Wild Girl. An interesting, stylistic touch by the filmmakers is the technique of changing scenes in the manner of turning pages in a book.
Big Brown Eyes is described as a "screwball comedy" in The Criterion Channel synopsis. But it has an awfully grim and tragic element that, for me, totally negated the TCC description.
Cary Grant and
Joan Bennett have a good chemistry as a crime-solving duo who have a romantic relationship that is more fiery and contentious than the bubbly partnership between
Nick and Nora Charles.
Walter Pidgeon -- in an atypical role as a suave, sophisticated heavy -- effectively scores with an understated performance. The contributions of
Lloyd Nolan,
Douglas Fowley (clean-shaven and, to me, looking like
Shemp Howard),
Alan Baxter, and
Henry Brandon both lighten and darken the multitonal plot, which alternates from breezy "battle of the sexes" romantic comedy to violent crime-drama.