Corrupt alcoholic attorney Tom Cardigan is one of the best lawyers around, commanding the courtroom like a stage and often winning his cases. Mobster Valentine Powers, who employs Cardigan and put him through school, asks him to represent a woman, June Perry, accused of prostitution. Cardigan agrees. But he never expected to fall for her, which is problematic since he's angling to become governor and will need the right kind of wife.
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New York City
USA
USA
About as "Pre-Code" as you can get, I suppose, and boy, does John Barrymore act his ass off!
John Barrymores his butt off as, first, an attorney, then, a District Attorney who is in a gangster's back pocket. Great forgotten actress Helen Twelvetrees is the former-prostitute-turned-Barrymore's-mistress who has more principles than he has. The two of them make the film never less than a master class in acting, though it does get a mite dull at times and has a sluggish pace. There are Pre-Codeisms all over the place, making it at least worth seeing.
Not to be confused with Counsellor at Law, another Pre-Code drama starring John Barrymore as a lawyer with a lot of baggage. This one, however, has Helen Twelvetrees, who is one of my favorite actresses from the early 1930s. She has these huge, sad eyes that convey so much, enough for you to immediately have empathy for her characters without knowing anything else about them. (Alas, her real life was pretty sad, too.)
Here, Twelvetrees plays a woman who Barrymore defends against accusations of prostitution, then takes home with him to be his live-in lover. (Pre-Code, baby!) However, soon Barrymore has his eyes on the governor's mansion, where a wife with a criminal past is not exactly welcome. And that's…
i'm so fond of helen twelvetrees & john barrymore and i'm also incredibly fond of this thirsty, thirsty screenland review by "delight evans"
Dear Mr. Barrymore: I want to tell you how much I like your new picture. I—Oh, sorry! That's my fan letter. This is my review. As a matter of fact, there is very little difference, because I am a John Barrymore fan since "Grand Hotel," so that any "criticism" of "State's Attorney" will read pretty much like a rave for its star. If you, too, have gone Barrymore, don't miss this film. It's all J.B.—quizzical smile, whimsical eyebrows, marvelously modulated voice, and Charm—lavished upon a rather routine melodrama about one of those very brilliant, very unmoral movie lawyers. I'm told by experts that the legal procedure in this picture is dizzily peculiar to Hollywood. But once you admit that, you can sit back and savor the suavities of this great Hamlet-gone-Hollywood. Yes, I'd say see it.
While I love John Barrymore, this was not one of his better films. A lower energy performance then usual and a story which just didn't feel plausible. The film shares a lot of the same faults as the Lee Tracy remake Criminal Lawyer (1937). Only difference is that the '32 version has more sleaze in it.
john and helen had so much chemistry in this im kinda obsessed with it and their characters dynamic,, some parts of the movie were a little boring (not that into gangster stuff sorry) but this was much better than i was expecting
Another in the “shady criminal defense attorney gets change of heart” genre, here John Barrymore is a mob lawyer who hops to the other side of the fence to become D.A., then gets temporarily blinded by ambitions of the governorship, turning his back on his loyal former prostitute girlfriend, players by Helen Twelvetrees. The melodramatic elements are hit and miss, but every scene with Barrymore doing courtroom oratorical theatrics is a fucking master class.
A terrific, character driven legal drama with some bursts of dark humor. John Barrymore puts on a tour de force here, with some great dramatic and comedic skills. He is a masterful drunk here.
The second John Barrymore film for me - another pleasant pre-code surprise.
I love Barrymore's fashion in this, why don't lawyers dress like that these days?? The pre-code dialogue, as always, is so fresh and honest, that it makes you realize how much they shut things up afterwards. The fact that he has a live-in mistress!! and they're not married!!! wow insane right. I enjoyed the noir aspects of this - the criminal world, the local politics, etc. John Barrymore's sarcastic comments in court were a trip, and his big, drawn out speeches weren't boring, but intriguing, especially that last one, what a bang to go out on. All of Barrymore's drunken scenes were hilarious as well, but his character…
