Steinesongo Too many fans seem to be blown away

Breakinger A Brilliant Conflict

Glucedee It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

Guillelmina The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Richard Chatten Just as birds descended from dinosaurs, so the film noir of the forties morphed by the mid-fifties into the women's picture; the histrionics of the Technicolor 'Leave Her to Heaven' (1945) evolving into Douglas Sirk's throbbing fifties melodramas.Occasional additional forays into Technicolor along the way in crime dramas like 'Desert Fury' (1947) and 'Rope' (1948) gave hints as to the way colour could embellish thriller material; and the fuzzy Pathécolor employed on 'This Is My Love' - along with the incredibly stagy sets - draws us gradually into what initially seems to promise to be a rather bland romantic drama, but proves anything but. The presence of Dan Duryea warns us that peril lies ahead - and the fact that he's in a wheelchair, in which he proves a pretty nifty mover - simply heightens the pent-up menace he brings to his part. (And wouldn't you know it, he depends on medication administered by his long-suffering wife and sister-in-law to keep him alive?) Practically everybody in the film turns to be nursing bottled up emotions threatening destructively to burst their banks in true 50's style, and... but I won't spoil it for you. Worth seeing.

jjnxn-1 Sadly obscure film noir painted in the blackest shades. Perhaps because it was made later in the cycle of film noir in color at the lower rung Republic Studios by director of little renown Stuart Heisler the film did not receive the prominence it deserves. It's not a classic of the genre in the Double Indemnity league but it is a well made, tightly paced dark journey of the soul with a couple of great performances at its core.Those two amazing performances come from artists who were often undervalued for their talents, Linda Darnell and Dan Duryea. Duryea plays a character he was known for-a cruel weasel, in this case his spirit has been twisted by his imprisonment in a wheelchair, who knows the weaknesses of those around him and takes glee in twisting the knife to ensure their misery is as profound as his. While he could play the good guy quite well his special talent was in this sort of parasite and here perhaps because he is matched against someone who can match him talent wise, Miss Darnell, his performance seems particularly sharp.The real standout though is Linda Darnell in one of her very best performances. Often wasted through her years as a top star at 20th Century Fox as mere decoration whenever she was given the opportunity to prove her mettle she always came through and was then sent back to pretty up another minor film. A shame had she been properly utilized she had the potential to be a tragedienne of the first order. This is one of those opportunities, unfortunately it came after her peak years and didn't slow the decline of her star-she would only make four more feature films spread out over the next 11 years. Her ironically named Vida Dove, meaning peaceful life, is living anything but. Lonely and full of bitterness at having to live with her sister, Faith Domergue, well cast since she and Linda could be sisters, who has married her former flame, Duryea now in that wheelchair. Shackled to them and tortured by him she is desperate for any way out. When she and Duryea square off it is truly an acting fireworks show. Enter handsome Rick Jason and a possible escape until he gets a look at Faith, also seeking an way out from the viperish Dan. Of course this sets the stage for unimaginable tragedy but it wouldn't be a noir if it didn't. Its all well presented but what sets it apart is the superior work of the top lined duo. Very hard to find but worth the effort.

judy-k-huddleston anyone know where i could get a copy of THIS IS MY LOVE . rick jason is great. he was lt. hanley in the COMBAT TV series. loved his voice. wonder why he did not become a bigger star, linda darnell was also a great actress and i read she died in a fire when she went in to get a child. wish that other rick jason stories were available as he not only could act well, he was very handsome. rick jason wrote in his autobiography that linda darnell was excellent to work with and played her role very well. rick jason is a fox in a henhouse. darnell and married sister both want him, and who can blame them. but this leads to trouble. tensions build and come to a climax, i especially liked jason taking darnell dancing. well worth seeing.

melvelvit-1 Linda Darnell stars as Vida, a sexually repressed spinster living with her vivacious sister Faith Domergue and Faith's crippled husband Dan Duryea in this quasi-noir romantic potboiler. Vida's a dreamy small-town Emma Bovary with unrealistic writing aspirations and a boring beau she barely tolerates and when handsome Rick Jason comes to the family diner where she and her sister work, he asks her out. Vida ruins every chance for happiness she ever had and this time is no exception because her self-pitying and depressing personality drives him into the arms of her married sister. This in turn tears the heart out of Duryea who's deeply in love with Faith but only half a man thanks to a terrible accident that ended their professional dancing career. He's become an embittered male shrew who delights in torturing Vida and this cuckold blames her for his wife's infidelity in a particularly vicious fight which drives Vida to go running for the medicine chest poison. Clever -and no slouch in the vindictive department herself- Vida's dark side sees a way to get even with Duryea and frame Domergue for his murder at the same time...Based on the novel "Fear Has Black Wings" and filmed in garish color by producer Allan Dowling and released by RKO, THIS IS MY LOVE comes as a nice little sleeper surprise for a number of reasons, not the least of which is Miss Linda Darnell. Comparing Linda to Bette Davis may sound amazing but it's awfully hard not to see what I mean. Darnell's Vida is a cross between Charlotte Vale of NOW VOYAGER and the ruthless Regina Giddons of THE LITTLE FOXES -especially when Vida just listens as Duryea dies screaming from the poison she gave him. All three protagonists are only half-alive in a claustrophobic house of hate, recrimination and regret which boils over, not unlike WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?. Linda Darnell does excellent work here. Bloated but still youthful, she encodes her character with the beauty Vida must have had in the bloom of youth and layers it with pent-up resentments seething just below the surface. One couldn't ask for more from the lady. This portrayal shows what Linda learned after 15 years in the fabulous Dream Factory called the Studio System where beauties like Hayworth, Tierney, Turner and Lamarr also learned to act in due time. Many feel A LETTER TO THREE WIVES is Darnell's best but some of the characterization depends on the lady's hard gloss/hard-bitten glamor but her Vida in THIS IS MY LOVE doesn't and she's also given stellar support. Alternately evoking hatred and sympathy in the audience, the much beloved character Dan Duryea comes perilously close to going over the top -but just try and look away. Howard Hughes' "Spruce Goose", Faith Domergue, isn't too bad trying to please everyone while making the best of a god-awful life and when a little happiness comes her way in the form of Rick Jason, it's hard to begrudge her. Cast and audience are torn as sympathy must go to Linda's Vida also. Duryea was Vida's beau back in the day until Faith took him and after living together for years, something wretched was bound to happen. Rick Jason is OK in a Tom Tryon kind of way as the tall, dark Adonis who hits town and ignites the fuse. Great as slice-of-life Americana, the film has 1950's vignettes galore; there's a few colorful dance palace scenes as Jason takes both sisters out for a whirl and glimpses of every-day Americans working/living at the diner. Stand-out is an old biddy with nothing better to do than come in, order apple-pie and eavesdrop on other people's love lives.Highly recommended. You'll see why after you see it.Jerry "Leave It To Beaver" Mathers, his look-alike sister Susie Mathers, Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer ("The Little Rascals"), William Hopper (Hedda's son and "Perry Mason" regular) and Ed Wood Jr.'s frequent leading lady Dolores Fuller all appear in small roles.Linda, as most fans know, died as a result of burns sustained in a fire in 1965 and Dan Duryea died of cancer in 1968. Faith died from cancer in 1999 (in England) and Rick Jason shot himself in 2000.