blanche-2 This is an early Barbara Stanwyck film, Shopworn, from 1932.After her father dies in a construction accident, Kitty Lane (Stanwyck) keeps her promise to her dad and goes to live with his sister (Zasu Pitts). There, she works as a waitress. It's a college town, and the guys are ga-ga over her, though she turns them all down. She falls for a bookish man, David (Regis Toomey), a medical student who doesn't seem to pay attention to her. David comes from a good family - his father is a Judge, and his mother is possessive. She does not approve of Kitty. She fakes an illness and David finds that he must take her to a specialist in Vienna. Before he leaves, he proposes to Kitty, intending that she join them. Everyone pretends to go along, but while packing, the police show up and arrest her for violating the public morals act, after she refuses the $5000 offered her. She is sentenced to prison for 90 days. David is told she took the money.Upon her release, Kitty joins the Follies and makes a great success. Six years later, David visits her dressing room. She leads him on just to reject him, but later, the two talk it out and get back together. But his mother is still a pain, referring to her as "that shopworn woman."One major scene was cut from this film - while in prison, Kitty miscarries a pregnancy, so it seems that she and David had quite the romance going. I wouldn't say that Regis Toomey, who became a prolific character actor, and Barbara Stanwyck are well-matched. In the beginning, his role is that of an easily-influenced young man where his parents are concerned, and back in those days, this wasn't unusual. Later on he seems better able to stand up for himself. But as a couple, even when she was just starting out, Stanwyck had star quality, so it doesn't really work.Stanwyck was a petite ball of fire, versatile, strong and charismatic, with a beautiful figure to boot. What a pleasure to see her in these early films. Watch it for her.

audiemurph TCM recently featured Barbara Stanwyck as their star of the month, giving them an opportunity to show a good number of the numerous films she pumped out very early in her career with Warner Brothers and Columbia. It is fascinating to watch several movies with the same star immediately one after another, because this way you get to determine how good an actor really is: do they become tiresome, or do they have staying power?Barbara Stanwyck was the real thing. Thanks to her understated skills, I found myself appreciating her more and more, the more films of hers I watched. By herself she could pull even the weakest script into something worth watching. "Shopworn", a typical quicky, was one of the best from those early days. Her range of talent was immense, playing, within this one film, a poverty-stricken waif and a successful Broadway star, playing happy and sad, incensed and appreciative, kindly and outraged, always with a dignity and slight detachment that are wondrous to watch. Again, it is sometimes only by watching multiple films of hers in succession to these nuances start to really make themselves known.This is a strong film, with a very good cast. Regis Toomey is very likable as Stanwyck's love interest, and Clara Blandick and Oscar Apfel, as Toomey's mother and her consort, are deliciously manipulative and evil. Zasu Pitts adds a little mild comedy to the proceedings, providing a nice contrast.Look for some very brave and quite interesting camera angles and panning sequences; one particularly good shot was taken of Stanwyck reaching under her bed for a suitcase - the camera is at floor level, shooting the scene from under the bed! Very unique and perhaps a little experimental for the time.I highly recommend this fast-paced little film; and highly recommend seeking out early Barbara Stanwyck gems like this!

Michael_Elliott Shopworn (1932) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Barbara Stanwyck plays Kitty Lane, a poor waitress who one days meets David Livingston (Regis Toomey) who is of course rich and comes from a respectable family. The two fall in love and decide to get married but his rather evil mother (Clara Blandick) will stop at nothing to keep them apart. Thinking he has left her, Kitty goes out to make something of herself. SHOPWORN is pretty predictable from start to finish but the attractive cast makes the film worth sitting through and especially since it runs a very fast 68-minutes. There's no question that the screenplay could have used a little work because everything that happens seems rather predictable and unoriginal even for 1932 standards. The poor girl being looked down upon by rich people is something we've seen many times and there's really nothing new done with it here. Even what happens to the character after she becomes famous is pretty standard stuff. What keeps the film moving along so well are the performances and especially the one from Stanwyck. She delivers a really well rounded performance as she perfectly nails both the tough and tender side of the character. Toomey is also quite good as the love interest and there's no question that Blandick does a very good job as the snake-hissing villain. Zasu Pitts is wasted in a supporting role but she's got one funny scene towards the start of the picture. The ending is one you'll see coming from a mile away and at times it gets so silly that I couldn't help but laugh but there's still enough going on here to make it worth viewing.

st-shot Working class heroine Barbara Stanwyck is tough as nails as she spits in "decent society's" face rather than buckle to bribe or threat as a waitress in an other side of the tracks romance with a med student in Shopworn.The son of an overly possessive mother, David Livingston falls hard for tip chaser Kitty Lane at a local greasy spoon. Clinging mom is not about to let this happen and she wastes no time in exercising her considerable pull in getting a big time judge relative to send her to the slammer for 90 days on morals charges. Upon release Kitty goes on stage and makes it big. Six years later she runs into David, now a doctor again along with his mother still intent on keeping a firm grip on him.There is some very ugly abuse of power that takes place in Shopworn as the son obsessed mother badgers the judge to do her corrupt bidding in getting Kitty out of the way. There are also swipes at law enforcement, the penal system and polite society, with Kitty being an ideal lynch pin for such actions. As Kitty, Stanwyck does an excellent job of vociferously exposing hypocrisy, especially in the scene where she is bribed and threatened as she throws the money in the judge's face and berates the police. The ending is contrived however and the sickeningly sweet finale is hard to swallow. Babs is too good for the lot of 'em. Mom and son (a wincingly woosie performance by Regis Toomey) don't deserve to be in the same room as her.