Other Titles • Barbary Coast • San Francisco im Goldfieber (1935) • Die Spielhölle an der Goldküste (1935)
Synopses for Barbary Coast (1935)
1.
Love was a gamble she couldn't afford to lose. When gorgeous gold digger Mary (Hopkins) lands in San Francisco - only to discover that her wealthy fiancé has been murdered - she loses no time hooking up with the richest crook in town (Robinson). But when she unexpectedly falls for a handsome, idealistic miner, she soon learns just how much money can't buy - and just how much she'll risk for a love that's worth it's weight in gold.
2.
Although ranked below Howard Hawks's best films (and his best are as best as movies get), this atmospheric melodrama set in lawless San Francisco in gold-rush days has always been warmly embraced by repertory audiences. Miriam Hopkins is top-billed as Mary Rutledge, newly arrived by ship in a picturesque fog, only to learn that the fiancé she came to join has been taken suddenly dead. In short order, demure Eastern girl Mary has transformed herself into Swan, toast of the Barbary Coast and mistress of its highest-rolling gambler: Edward G. Robinson doing a ringleted 19th-century variant of his trademark gangster role. Eventually Joel McCrea, as a prospector with scant luck but a poetic streak, completes the requisite romantic triangle as ordained by screenwriters Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur.
Robinson was always a class act, and he brings a surprising, even moving, vulnerability to the role of a man with the power to have virtually anybody killed--but not to compel Swan to love him. The movie's other most memorable presence is Walter Brennan, stepping into character-actor stardom as a toothless wharf rat who tries--and hilariously fails--to live up to his own billing as "Old Atrocity." He'd have won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor if they gave such things in 1935. They started the following year and he was the first winner--for another Hawks picture, Come and Get It. --Richard T. Jameson
3.
A drama about the tough Barbary Coast during the late 1800s.
4.
In BARBARY COAST, Mary Rutledge (Miriam Hopkins) travels to San Francisco at the height of the gold rush to meet the man she has arranged to marry, a prospector who has struck it rich. When she arrives she finds him dead, thanks to local casino owner and crime boss Louis Chamalis (Edward G. Robinson). Mary takes up with Chamalis in a business partnership: He nicknames her Swan and hires her as a main attraction in his casino, the Bella Donna. Mary quickly grows tired of Chamalis’s strong-arm habits and runs away, falling in love with thoughtful prospector James Carmichael (Joel McCrea); meanwhile, Louis and his thugs are abusing power and harassing or killing those who would expose their crimes. A colorful and entertaining period drama, half gangster picture and half Western, BARBARY COAST features a strong performance by Robinson as the flamboyant Chamalis and a notable appearance by Walter Brennan as Old Atrocity. The film also showcases the song "I Dream of Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair."
Mooviees.com is not the official site for this film.
All editorial views and opinions expressed here are for entertainment purposes only.
<>
Movie Database
In Theaters
