In the Jazz Age days of flappers, gangsters, and bathtub gin, Helen Morgan was the greatest torch singer, a petite brunette who sat atop pianos plaintively warbling sad songs about the men who mistreated her. More a profile of those songs than a detailed exposition of her life, this film
offers only a slice of a fabulous and unforgettable career. In this version, the fates of Morgan (Ann Blyth) and tough guy Larry (Paul Newman) are inextricably linked from the time he first spots her in Chicago, where she sings and does the hula in sideshows, through fame and ill-gotten fortune
(strong-arm sales of bootleg hooch), on to the collapse of both their careers--hers in a...
Released:
1957
Rated:
NR
Length:
118 mins