I have an important note about this film. I have rented many hundred DVDs from Netflix and this is the first one which has absolutely horrid sound mixing. One minute, you can barely hear the actors....so you turn up the volume. The next, the music comes on and you are blasted with sound! Some of the actors are clear and understandable, while others sound like their whispering! I have no idea why they didn't correct this on the DVD...as it's nearly unwatchable. To get around this, kind of, I turned on the closed captions and then I didn't have to worry as much about the horribly uneven sound. I have no idea if this same problem exists if they show this film on television and not DVD...but the DVD is so bad that if I bought it, I'd return it!!
As I watched "Susan Slade" I kept thinking that the story was almost like "A Summer Place, Part II". This is because like this previous film, it stars Dorothy McGuire and Troy Donahue. Instead of Sandra Dee, the film features Connie Stevens, who, frankly, looks a lot like Dee. And the story, well, like "A Summer Place", it's about premarital sex and pregnancy's impact on a teenage mother. I can only assume that the studio and producers thought that since the previous film was a big box office hit, copying much of it would result in another hit.
The story is about Susan Slade (Connie Stevens), a girl from a rich and seemingly happy family. Life is good...until Susan realizes she's pregnant by a guy she met on a cruise. But he won't respond to her letters and she appears to have been dumped...and eventually she learns that he's died! So, her mother concocts a plan...for Susan to give birth in another country and when they return, her mother will pretend that the baby is hers. Can Susan still, somehow find love? And, what about this family secret?
"Susan Slade" is a soapy sort of drama that was rather popular in the late 50s and early 60s. Lushly filmed, great to look at and also, a tad plodding and bland. It's not like it's a terrible movie, but it SHOULD have been better and more interesting. I think the film could have used a bit of a trim to tighten it up and some of the acting is just not particularly inspired. Overall, an okay film....but nothing more.
As I watched "Susan Slade" I kept thinking that the story was almost like "A Summer Place, Part II". This is because like this previous film, it stars Dorothy McGuire and Troy Donahue. Instead of Sandra Dee, the film features Connie Stevens, who, frankly, looks a lot like Dee. And the story, well, like "A Summer Place", it's about premarital sex and pregnancy's impact on a teenage mother. I can only assume that the studio and producers thought that since the previous film was a big box office hit, copying much of it would result in another hit.
The story is about Susan Slade (Connie Stevens), a girl from a rich and seemingly happy family. Life is good...until Susan realizes she's pregnant by a guy she met on a cruise. But he won't respond to her letters and she appears to have been dumped...and eventually she learns that he's died! So, her mother concocts a plan...for Susan to give birth in another country and when they return, her mother will pretend that the baby is hers. Can Susan still, somehow find love? And, what about this family secret?
"Susan Slade" is a soapy sort of drama that was rather popular in the late 50s and early 60s. Lushly filmed, great to look at and also, a tad plodding and bland. It's not like it's a terrible movie, but it SHOULD have been better and more interesting. I think the film could have used a bit of a trim to tighten it up and some of the acting is just not particularly inspired. Overall, an okay film....but nothing more.