Laughing Sinners (1931)

Fans of 1930s-1940s films HAVE TO see Clark Gable in this film. Before his studio handlers figured out how to make him a stud, he was unmemorable and frankly not all that handsome. Weak chin and all that. In this film, the camera seldom shoots him straight on. Just three years later, Gable would star with Claudette Colbert in IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT and rock the hearts of female fans everywhere. And then in 1939 there was ,,, ,,, GONE WITH THE WIND.The other User Reviews here for LAUGHING SINNERS a/k/a COMPLETE SURRENDER are more than sufficient; no need to repeat what they've already said. My hope is that you'll watch this as the BEFORE photo of Gable, and then see what the backstage experts of Hair, Make-up Studio Publicity were able to do with this (almost) sallow-faced young man -- to create the AFTER Gable that was to come. No wonder they hand out Oscars for the Great Ones in categories beyond just Best Film, Actor and Director.

Clark Gable is particularly handsome in his Salvation Army uniform.He is very efficient when it comes to showing seduced girl Crawford the straight and narrow!And he must display lots and lots of patience ,indulgence and compassion for ,even after the marriage of her beau ,a smug buck,she's ready to fall in love again head over heels . Gable and Crawford singing canticles while delivering free meals to the needy.What a nice way to redeem your soul and to find true love!What's really tragic is that these poor people are still looking for free meals in the soup kitchen ,be it the the Salvation Army or one of the other charitable organizations .In France ,in the organization I'm currently working for("Les Restos Du Coeur" ) ,the number of beneficiaries has increased by 15% in 2010-2011.

Like a lot of early '30s film, I found this a pretty interesting short (72 minutes) story. This one is about a chorus girl-type who gets jilted, hooks up with a Salvation Army man, then is enticed back to the old sinful ways for a night with the man who jilted her and finally realizes she is better off with the good guy and the good morals.This is an early look at Joan Crawford, who is blonde here with huge eyes. Clark Gable is sans mustache and really looks young. Neil Hamilton, the third lead, is the same man who went on to play Commissioner Gordon in the Batman TV series three decades later. In here, he's the pagan bad guy.This film goes a long way in portraying traveling salesmen as morally bankrupt people. Now why would they do that?!!

A curious mixture of grit and fluff that doesn't work because of their incompatibility. Best is the rendering of the traveling salesman's grubby milieu: booze, poker games, floozies, boredom, played out in second-rate hotels and saloons. Though seemingly at home on the perimeter of these surroundings, cabaret singer and dancer Ivy (Joan Crawford) is incredibly naive, believing she has found fidelity and true love in her affair with the sleaziest of the traveling men. When he jilts her, she chooses suicide - until saved, at the last instant, by a cloyingly sanctimonious Salvation Army worker, Carl (played by a badly miscast Clark Gable), who persuades her that, whatever her mistakes, she has much to live for. Ivy devotes herself to the Army's mission, finds fulfillment and inner peace - until a chance encounter with her devious former lover causes her to fall by the wayside once again - until the latter's confrontation with Carl causes her to be saved once again - this time for keeps (we are meant to believe), as Ivy and Carl literally walk off into the sunset. It's all a bit much.Guy Kibbee and Roscoe Karns score highest as a couple of washed-out drummers, present and future. An added bonus is Joan's very appealing "eccentric" dance routine. But her character, around which the story revolves, is simply too extreme and inconsistent to be convincing.