charlesem In A Lady of Chance, Norma Shearer has a role that would later be perfected by Barbara Stanwyck: the tough grifter with a soft heart. The story is nonsense: She falls for her mark, a Southerner (Johnny Mack Brown) she thinks is a rich man, even after he takes her home to Alabama and she learns that she has jumped to the wrong conclusion. Stanwyck does it better in Ball of Fire (Howard Hawks, 1941) and The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges, 1941), but Stanwyck also had better directors than the prolific but undistinguished Robert Z. Leonard. He allows, or perhaps encourages, Shearer to mug and pose endlessly; at first she's delightful, but a little of that sort of thing goes a long way. A Lady of Chance also contains an embarrassing heap of period racism, when Shearer and Brown are being wheeled along the Atlantic City boardwalk by a singing black man, and Brown remarks that it reminds him of "the darkies singing on the plantation back home."

classicsoncall After all this time, this is my first look at Norma Shearer, just before she and MGM took the plunge into talking films. Very curiously, Turner Classics Movie host Robert Osborne introduced this picture the other night, stating that in one sense, this was Shearer's first 'talkie', but she didn't actually speak in it, having her voice dubbed in afterward when MGM realized that movie fans actually DID want to see them in preference to silent films. So the entire picture I'm waiting for her or any of the other characters to speak, but it never happened. So I don't know what happened there.I was rather surprised by an early reference in the story to Dolly Morgan's (Shearer) character, after a title card mentioned that she provided businessman T. Roger Hammond with ten thousand dollars worth of experience! That could have been taken any number of ways and I'm wondering if my initial response was justified. You know what I'm talking about, what do YOU think? Perhaps the bigger surprise for me in this picture was the appearance of Johnny Mack Brown (here billed as John Mack Brown). I'm more used to seeing him in cowboy gear atop a horse in any number of B Westerns, so he looked a bit out of his element here. He was actually quite the handsome leading man in this flick, but apparently with limited range as an actor, his career path brought him to the Western genre in which he became quite popular for almost three decades.After 'trapping' Steve Crandall (Brown) into marriage, Angel Face Dolly undergoes a couple changes of heart before she realizes where her true feelings lie. I don't know if some of the situations were meant to be intentionally funny or not, but the mention of a 'tile and cement' convention in Atlantic City managed to crack me up considerably. Later on, the idea that Steve Crandall would offer to 'take custody' of Dolly after appearing before the parole board for past violations really made me think about how society dealt with these issues in the Twenties. There's also that uncomfortable reminder of race relations that existed almost a century ago, a repeated reference to 'darkies' that sounds rather jarring when you hear or read about it today.

wes-connors In a "ritzy" hotel, seductive Norma Shearer (as Dolly "Angel Face" Morgan) uses her job as telephone operator to connect with wealthy gentlemen. Recently paroled, Ms. Shearer shows off her thighs under torn stockings while sharing a hard luck story, then lures the men to her apartment. There is, of course, a high price to be paid; in case on screen, Shearer makes out with a tidy $10,000. The plot thickens when Shearer's crooked cohorts Lowell Sherman (as Bradley) and Gwen Lee (as Gwen) want a piece of her solo action. Shearer successfully scams the pair, but they turn up to cause more trouble when she sets her sights on handsome cement tycoon Johnny Mack Brown (as Steve Crandall), who has a surprise of his own to reveal...This was Shearer's last "silent" film; though MGM seemed reluctant to move their stars into talking pictures, several of them became even bigger stars, so the delay worked out very well for those. Curiously, this film has been shown without its "Synchronized Musical Score and Sound Effects" (SSE) on "Turner Classic Movies" (TCM). TCM premiered "A Lady of Chance" with an "all-new" music score in 2001, but had host Robert Osborne discussing the original soundtrack before a 2012 "Silent Sunday" airing, apparently unaware TCM was not showing the original version. Late 1920s "silent films" (which were never "silent") were typically released with SSE. Hopefully, the original soundtracks will be restored; the present trend needs reversing.***** A Lady of Chance (12/1/28) Robert Z. Leonard ~ Norma Shearer, Lowell Sherman, Johnny Mack Brown, Gwen Lee

Patrick-96 "A Lady of Chance" was Norma Shearer's last silent film. The Turner Movie Classic channel debut of this forgotten gem with a brand-new score, took place on August 15, 2001. It was a total delight! The print was in excellent condition and looked just as audiences first saw it in 1928. Norma, who never looked lovelier, was in top form and showed how adept she was as a silent movie actress. Never let anyone say that she couldn't handle comedy! It's a fun film to watch and I recommend it to anyone, not just Shearer fans.