The Animal Kingdom

CinemaSerf

Leslie Howard certainly had a star quality about him, and he demonstrates that with aplomb here, but the story is just, well, wet... He is caught in a seemingly genuine love triangle between "Daisy" (Ann Harding") and wife "Cecelia" (Myrna Loy) and spends much of the time, aided ably by permanently sozzled butler "Red" (William Gargan) vacillating - occasionally comically - as he treads the fine line between the pair of them. The performances and writing are fine, nothing more, but I just found the story wore way too thin, too quickly - and "Daisy", frankly, deserved far better than to be involved at all... What it does seem to comment upon, surprisingly for 1932, is an acceptability from all concerned - including, to a certain extent from the families, that this arrangement though frustrating, isn't wrong. The film shows an enlightening degree of non-judgmentalism that I found quite refreshing.