Although Saratoga is a lighthearted comedy about the horse racing game set in that former pleasure town of the rich and famous with the death of Jean Harlow while filming this movie it carries an aura of sadness that at least for me is impossible to overcome.
It's an average film and not anything close to what I believe Harlow's best work on screen in such items as Libeled Lady, The Girl From Missouri, Dinner At Eight, and Red Dust. Still her final film was with her most frequent screen partner and one whom she had great chemistry with.
Clark Gable plays a bookmaker who has some big IOUs from Jean's father Jonathan Hale who dies and passes those on to his daughter. Jean has an easy out if she marries wealthy Walter Pidgeon who's panting hot and heavy for her. But she eventually sees Gable is the one for her.
What is also sad is that Harlow for whatever reason kept going when it is obviously apparent she's suffering from the undiagnosed uremic poisoning that eventually killed her. That's a separate issue from the legendary story that her mother's Christian Science beliefs prevented her from seeking the medical treatment that would have saved her life. Maybe she should have been replaced and the film re-shot, who can know about these things?
Jean Harlow was the subject of a couple of lurid films based on Irving Schulman's book about her life that came out in the Sixties. By all accounts I've read about her from her contemporaries, Jean Harlow was a kind and gracious woman who was generous to a fault and always willing to help a newcomer. I would recommend reading Rosalind Russell's autobiography Life Is A Banquet where she talks about how Jean helped Russell the rookie on the set of China Seas.
So this review is dedicated to Jean Harlow and for all the great performances she had in her that we were never destined to see.
It's an average film and not anything close to what I believe Harlow's best work on screen in such items as Libeled Lady, The Girl From Missouri, Dinner At Eight, and Red Dust. Still her final film was with her most frequent screen partner and one whom she had great chemistry with.
Clark Gable plays a bookmaker who has some big IOUs from Jean's father Jonathan Hale who dies and passes those on to his daughter. Jean has an easy out if she marries wealthy Walter Pidgeon who's panting hot and heavy for her. But she eventually sees Gable is the one for her.
What is also sad is that Harlow for whatever reason kept going when it is obviously apparent she's suffering from the undiagnosed uremic poisoning that eventually killed her. That's a separate issue from the legendary story that her mother's Christian Science beliefs prevented her from seeking the medical treatment that would have saved her life. Maybe she should have been replaced and the film re-shot, who can know about these things?
Jean Harlow was the subject of a couple of lurid films based on Irving Schulman's book about her life that came out in the Sixties. By all accounts I've read about her from her contemporaries, Jean Harlow was a kind and gracious woman who was generous to a fault and always willing to help a newcomer. I would recommend reading Rosalind Russell's autobiography Life Is A Banquet where she talks about how Jean helped Russell the rookie on the set of China Seas.
So this review is dedicated to Jean Harlow and for all the great performances she had in her that we were never destined to see.