Come Back Little Sheba (1952) - Delbert Mann

Wow what were they thinking? How many times have you asked yourself that watching an Oscar favorite? Well it happens a lot with me, and this was the film that brought Shirley Booth (a somewhat known stage New York stage actress) her one and only Oscar for best actress. Booth is absolutely terrible here. Her character is irritating from the first few minutes and it doesn't let up. Someting is indeed disturbing about a wife referring to her husband as "daddy" and same goes for a husband calling his wife "mommy" I mean that's enough to make you shiver.

Burt Lancaster is rarely ever bad, and I think he does just fine here, in a rather quiet performance. Booth on the other hand just gets melodramatic, so by the time she finally has a chance to do some "acting" we've pretty much lost interest in the story. The plot is slow and almost completely uneventful. I thought my girlfriend occasionally asks questions that she shouldn't but Booth's character takes that to a new extreme. Which leads me to believe that she just might be retarded, but I haven't done enough research into the source material and I'm not going to.

There are some young characters and they help to motivate the story slightly, but as supporting parts they just can't work. Booth's role was originally offered to Bette Davis, and perhaps she could have handled this better. It's a shame too, because well we all know what I think about 1952, but I really don't think the year was fantastic for actresses. If you're wondering just who I would have given the trophy to, I'd vote for Maureen O'Hara for The Quiet Man, now that was a strong female role.

Grade D +