JohnHowardReid After the brilliance of "Those High Grey Walls" it was inevitable that director Charles Vidor would most likely be stuck with a lesser screenplay for his next assignment. In fact, Edward Small now asked for Vidor's services on My Son, My Son (1940), an adaptation of Howard Spring's best-selling English novel about a best-selling English novelist, who does everything he can to spoil his son. Brian Aherne is the excessively fond father. Louis Hayward plays the wayward son who, after failing to seduce his future step-mother (Madeleine Carroll), succeeds instead in seducing the daughter (Laraine Day) of his father's best friend (Henry Hull). In the book by Howard Spring, the son dies by hanging; in the film, however, he dies a hero! Admittedly, director Vidor and his players give this potboiler from Howard Spring's remarkably successful novel the full treatment, but I would normally doubt if "My Son, My Son" would earn many brownie points among moviegoers and television fanatics today. But I stand corrected , however. The movie has earned some enthusiastic reviews at IMDb even though it betrays the book and provides an entirely different outcome for its degenerate "hero"!

mukava991 Not having read the novel upon which this tedious film was based, I can only guess that it must have been epic and dense with lots of character detail, one of those historical romances the reader can get lost in. Translated to celluloid it becomes a long series of episodic sketches transporting us from the Victorian age to World War One. Brian Aherne comes across as a bland variation of Erroll Flynn; he seems to stand around looking vaguely disappointed much of the time. Amazingly, his character is a highly successful novelist-turned-playwright but we get no sense of what relationship his art has to who he is as a man. Ostensibly he is from the slums but never does he look, act or speak like someone from that social stratum. Madeleine Carroll as always is lovely to behold but is given very little to do. Louis Hayward has the meatiest role as the rotter son but even his character lacks depth. His delivery reminds one of Noel Coward, who, by the way, mentored him early in his career. The whole enterprise has a highly artificial look and feel, particularly in the battle sequences featuring Hayward. All this adds up to a most unengaging 2 hours.

crimmins325 I gave this a "7" mainly on the strength of Louis Hayward's performance. I did not catch the beginning credits and so spent the whole picture wondering who young Essex was. I thought it was a young Dirk Bogarde! As noted before, Laraine Day (again a surprise) was miscast, although very pretty indeed. here she was an English girl, daughter of Irish parents, yet with an American accent. Day had a busy year in '40, having a leading lady role in "foreign correspondent". henry hull, as her father, was quite recognizable. Surprisingly, I thought the normally beauteous Madeline Carroll was a bit heavy, and older looking. well, her role did call for her to be a more mature woman, both as a counter-point to young Essex and mature for the older Essex. I don't know anyone who could be more fitting as the young rotter Essex, with Hayward's patented smirk and sarcastic voice. Brent was a study in naivete and at times seemed a bit bewildered how he should act in certain scenes. the movie must have been hard for the Brits to be really interested, what with WW11 already started and this movie's time period being up to and during WW1. Perhaps its production started before sept. '39.

Neil Doyle For almost two hours, BRIAN AHERNE suffers nobly as a man whose only son is a rotten, spoiled liar and scoundrel (LOUIS HAYWARD). He plays the man in a rather naive, prissy and Victorian way who always means to punish his son for his indiscretions but is quickly convinced by his charming no good son that he's completely innocent and his motives have been misunderstood.Hayward plays the wayward son with a winning smile and open-eyed look that is supposed to deceive everyone but the two women who seem to know him for what he is--MADELEINE CARROLL (looking elegantly beautiful, a vision of blonde loveliness) and pert looking LARAINE DAY as a young actress compromised by him and secretly in love with his father. By the time she commits suicide, the story has reached the apex of its tear-jerker status. The story, instead, concludes with the son being awarded the Victorian Cross for his bravery in battle (World War I), and Aherne is happy that his son died a hero.It's a story of unrequited love and tries for a bittersweet effect, but misses the mark along the way. Aherne is just too maddeningly naive and Hayward too obviously deceitful for the story to make sense. It's further hurt by the happy ending that seems to have been tacked on, it's so untrue to the characters. I understand that in the novel, the young man's character was not redeemed and he died on the gallows.On the technical side, the Art Direction won an Oscar nomination and the B&W photography by Harry Stradling, Jr. is very effective.Trivia note: Why did Hollywood casting directors make such obvious mistakes when selecting children who turn into adults? I mean how does cherubic SCOTTY BECKETT (much too sweet looking here) turn into LOUIS HAYWARD as an adult? No way this could have happened!! You might as well have Mickey Rooney turn into Tyrone Power.