MADAME BUTTERFLY (1932)

In 1930s Japan, Cho-Cho San (Sylvia Sidney), whose name means "butterfly," is forced to train as a geisha to help out her struggling family. Her first night on the job at Goro's Tea House, she is admired by the upper class Yamodori who plans to propose marriage, but visting American navy officer Pinkerton (Cary Grant) gets to her first. In Japan, such women are "married" by contract, and automatically divorced if the husband leaves, so Pinkerton basically decides to take her as his wife as long as he's stationed in Japan, despite having a serious girlfriend back home. They have an idyllic life together until Pinkerton is sent back to the States. On his last night, he breaks the news to her, but sings her a love song and promises to return in the spring. Three springs later, Cho-Cho San has a son and still hopes for Pinkerton's return; this spring, he does return, and stops by just long enough to introduce his American wife. She doesn't tell him about their son, but after he leaves, she arranges for her son to live with her family and commits suicide.

I've never seen the famous opera (nor read the original story) this film is based on, but I'm familiar with the plot, and this feels like a Reader's Digest abridgment. Though it's nearly 90 minutes long, and is paced well, nothing much seems to happen. Neither of the main characters is really fleshed out much, which is a particular problem with Pinkerton; he's played by the young Cary Grant and, though he acts in what most would consider a despicable manner toward his Japanese wife, he seems completely clueless about the pain he has caused her. He doesn't come off as mean or hateful, just like a man who has committed a social faux pas that is barely worth pondering. It all feels like a situation comedy but without the comedy—though there is some comic relief in the form of Charles Ruggles as Grant's buddy. Sidney has to struggle with a Hollywood stereotype of an accent—though I did like the throwaway line that she was taught a "high-class Brooklyn accent" by a scholar. Interesting but not essential. [DVD]