Movie Reviewed: Rain (1932), starring Joan Crawford and Walter Huston

Movie Reviewed: Rain (1932), starring Joan Crawford and Walter Huston

A controversial pre-code film starring Walter Huston and Joan Crawford

Rain is a 1932 South Seas drama directed by Lewis Milestone with portions filmed at Santa Catalina Island, California. The film stars Joan Crawford as a wild lady Sadie Thompson and features Walter Huston as a conflicted missionary who wants to reform her, but his own morals come into question. The role of Sadie Thompson was written for Gloria Swanson, but director Lewis Milestone, relied on his instinct to cast Joan Crawford. With her curly blonde hair, thick make-up, large beauty-spot, gaudy dresses, jingling bracelets and high heels she accepted to take a shot at it in this Joseph Scheck’s production. Incidentally Crawford was loaned out by MGM to United Artists to do this film. It didn’t help; Rain was not well received critically or financially. The unglamorous role for Crawford, and bold story about religious hypocrisy caught depression-era audiences off guard. The film earned $538,000 in the US and Canada and $166,000 elsewhere resulting in a total loss of $198,000. Years later, critics looked at the artistic elements of the movie and began to appreciate the efforts of Joan Crawford and Walter Huston. Maxwell Anderson wrote the screenplay for this story from Somerset Maugham.