Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Lollivan It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Griff Lees Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Janae Milner Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

dougdoepke No need to recap the plot.Thanks to some fairly gritty touches, the movie manages to avoid the sappy pitfalls of most soapers. Good touch making Dad (Rains) a likable curmudgeon, plus a sneaky Aunt Etta (Robson) who can out-cranky him one-on-one. Then, of course, there's the star-crossed Mickey (Garfield), a street tough musician and ethnic type, who sticks out in the whitebread family like the proverbial onion in a petunia patch. Together, these touches manage to keep the bubbly household from floating away. Naturally, with four lovely girls animating the family, there're bound to be romantic entanglements, which, of course, make up the plot. I'm glad Ann (Priscilla) has blonde hair because I was having real trouble telling the three brunettes apart. Priscilla Lane really registers, along with Garfield in his first, break-out, role. He also shows more self-doubt than maybe any other time in a storied career. Also, I agree that Jeffrey Lynn is livelier than usual and does well as the handsome swain. Too bad we don't see more of the other three sisters as individuals instead of part of the supporting chorus.All in all, however, it's really director Curtiz who keeps the sentimental package from unraveling. At no point does he milk the emotional scenes, ever a temptation for this type material. So what we come away with is the charm of an ideal family without the usual cloy-- no mean accomplishment. Of course, it also helps to have a squeaky swinging gate somewhere in the background.(In Passing-- note how the spread of radio is used as the hallmark of a generational shift. The girls like swing music as much as the classics, much to Dad's chagrin. Then too, why make your own parlor room music when the radio is as easy as an "On" button. I guess TV was not the first electronic device to re-orient family life.)

wes-connors The musically inclined "Four Daughters" of the title are charmed by the arrival of composer Jeffrey Lynn (as Felix Deitz), who seems most taken with pretty blonde Priscilla Lane (as Ann Lemp). A marriage seems probable, but gruff pianist John Garfield (as Mickey Borden) is also in love with Ms. Lane... Original writer Fannie Hurst's "Sister Act" would have been better a better title as this film is mostly about Lane's "Ann" character, and her courtship by Mr. Lynn and Mr. Garfield. The screenplay is too obvious, but the production really excels in the direction by Michael Curtiz. He gets a responsive cast to convey believable emotions with words, posturing, and fleeting glances; orchestrated to elicit feelings and relationships we've all experienced.******** Four Daughters (8/9/38) Michael Curtiz ~ Priscilla Lane, John Garfield, Jeffrey Lynn, Claude Rains

bkoganbing One of Warner Brothers best and highest grossing films during the Thirties was this charming family drama about a widower who lives with his maiden sister raising Four Daughters. But not four every day type daughters. All of them have been trained by their musician father on instruments and one as a singer. They do make some beautiful music together even if it is for the long haired set.You can watch the infinite variety of roles that Claude Rains played over the years and still marvel as he shows you yet another aspect of his creative personality. The opportunistic Vichy Captain in Casablanca is as different as the scientist gone mad in the Invisible Man, as the patient and wise Job in Mr. Skeffington. All the same man and all so incredibly different.Here he raises the four girls with love seasoned with a little grouchiness at their willingness to accept modern music. The Lane Sisters and Gale Page may know Beethoven, but they're hep cats as well and can beat daddy eight to the bar every time. And if Rains gets a bit too testy than Aunt May Robson can put him in his place.With Four Daughters unmarried at the time you know that's going to change. All the sisters develop romantic interests in Dick Foran, Frank McHugh, Jeffrey Lynn, and John Garfield. Of course the mating process does get a bit complicated and one of the sisters suffers a tragedy, but it does promise to work out as the film ends.Four Daughters is also known as the debut film of John Garfield. Other than a tiny bit part in Footlight Parade years earlier, Garfield had no other film roles. But he'd been acclaimed on the New York stage for his performance in Golden Boy and Warner Brothers signed him and found the perfect film debut role as the cynical musician who just can't quite get a decent break in life. It earned him a Best Supporting Actor nomination in 1938, but he lost to Walter Brennan for Kentucky.This film was so popular that it practically spawned a small cottage industry for Jack Warner. Sequels with cast members like Daughters Courageous, Four Mothers, Four Wives all cleaned up at the box office before World War II. And Warner Brothers remade it with Frank Sinatra and Doris Day playing the parts that John Garfield and Priscilla Lane originated. Now those two made some beautiful music.Still a timeless mold was created in Four Daughters and the film holds up 70 years after it was first seen.

ccthemovieman-1 Although a "woman's story," I found this still fairly interesting. It is unusual in that is has three real-life sisters playing sisters in the movie! I am referring to Priscilla, Rosemary and Lola Lane.Why national critics loved this movie was the presence of bad-boy-rebel John Garfield. In their twisted Liberal-dominated minds, All-American characters are sickening but sour-on- life, poor-attitude types like Garfield played here are people they can identify with. Despite that, this movie still has an overall feeling of goodness, which is why I liked it. Some of the characters may have done stupid things, but they good hearts. Whose heart was bigger than "Ann's" (Priscilla Lane) in here? I agree with the IMDb user comments critic in here who says this is Priscilla's film as much as the beloved (not by me) Garfield's. With a director the caliber of Michael Curtiz, the film is better than it might have been under someone else. Curtiz made sure no scene, soapy or otherwise, went on too long.In addition to the Lane sisters and Garfield, we have Claude Rains (who adds much-needed humor to the story), Jeffrey Lynn (the main love interest of the girls), Gale Page, Dick Foran, Frank McHugh and Mae Robson.Apparently, this movie must have been a hit because there were several spin-offs from it, neither of them approaching this one in content and box-office success.