Back Street

Directed by John M. Stahl, Back Street details the decades-long relationship between a married man (John Boles’ Walter Saxel) and his faithful mistress (Irene Dunne’s Ray Schmidt). Filmmaker Stahl, armed with a screenplay by Gladys Lehman and Lynn Starling, delivers a mostly compelling melodrama that benefits from its brisk pace and ingratiating, compelling central performance, as, in terms of the latter, Dunne offers up sympathetic work that ultimately compensates for the decidedly oddball nature of the picture’s plot – with, in addition, the obvious chemistry between Ray and Walter enhancing the perpetually watchable vibe. (It’s ultimately interesting, in terms of that plot, that Stahl asks the viewer to actively root against the coupling between Dunne and Boles’ respective characters, as it remains clear from start to finish that Ray deserves so much better and should undoubtedly settle for George Meeker’s affable, devoted figure.) The eventual tear-jerking finale is, as one might’ve anticipated, unable to pack the emotional punch for which Stahl is obviously striving, and yet it’s hard to deny that Back Street does, for the most part, come off as a compulsively watchable endeavor that boasts an intriguing, far-from-conventional romantic relationship at its core.

*** out of ****