SimonJack
Nobody could play a mean, nasty, unlikeable character in the movies better than James Cagney. The veteran actor proved his mettle as Martin "Marty" Snyder in "Love Me or Leave Me." Doris Day was an excellent singer and she does a very good job in this film. But, Day's voice sounded nothing like that of Ruth Etting, whom she plays here. Day's singing is robust and full of life. She plays her character that way here as well, even in the somber numbers. That's quite different from the character and musical delivery of Etting. She had a distinctive sound – higher in the early years, and somewhat nasal, but appealing in later life. And, she had a tinge of sultry about her when she sang. Etting said she would have preferred someone else to have played her in this film. If Moe "The Gimp" Snyder was as mean and bad a character as he is in this film, one might conclude that Ruth Etting was nuts for marrying him – let alone, having anything to do with him at all. But this movie is Hollywood, and a highly fictionalized account of the years of Etting's career as a singer. Without a researched biography book, too little about Etting's life is really known. And, of what has been written about her, many pieces are conflicting from source to source. At best, her past is fuzzy. One wonders why more details weren't written about her childhood and early career. Even with the scandal at the height of her career (former husband shooting current lover), Etting's life remains something of a mystery. While Day's acting is OK here, her character strikes me as too strong and determined. From what we know about Etting, she was anything but that way. Her character here seems just not right. The rest of the cast are OK. Some were fictional, others based on real people. This film is entertaining for the songs that Doris Day sings. But as a biopic about Ruth Etting it seems too unreal. Hollywood tends to glamorize the lives of musical people in its biopics. In this case, MGM did a major fictional piece with many changes in Etting's personal life. Some facts about her life and career are noteworthy for their exclusion in this film. The first is that Martin "Moe the Gimp" Snyder was married and that he divorced his wife to marry Etting. (Doesn't that throw a different light on the whole movie and its implication that Ruthie was pressured into marrying the Gimp?) The second is that Snyder wasn't a wealthy business owner and gangland boss. He worked as a bodyguard for prominent people, including those in the entertainment field, and had many contacts there. The third is that Etting's second husband, Harry Myrl Alderman ("Johnny," in the movie), also was married when he and Etting began their relationship. (After Snyder shot Alderman, the latter's wife accused Etting of alienation of affections when she filed for divorce.) From the facts known about her but not shown in this film, is it too much to wonder why Etting's career may have so soon come to an end? Some other people with Hollywood scandals survived them to go on with their careers. But, if Ruth Etting was seen as a home wrecker in the 1930s, that might have been enough to end her career in Hollywood. But why her singing career? Again, some mystery. Maybe Etting really loved Snyder and didn't care about breaking up his marriage. Or, she might have married him just for his entertainment connections, as this movie implies. That would be a reason to tolerate his crude and mean nature. Maybe she fell in love with her piano player, and didn't care that he was married. Or, she didn't care about her career at that point. The movie implies the Snyder roughneck stuff might have turned Hollywood off for using Etting in films. She starred in nearly three dozen shorts from 1929 through 1936. Most were short story plots in which she sang two or three songs. They were entertaining musically, but the acting was mostly like that of B-films. If anything, Etting seems plain or droll in her roles in the shorts I've seen. She did appear in three feature films, but only in minor roles to sing a number or two. She said herself that she didn't know how to act. Had she real talent for acting, one would think Hollywood would have ensured that she weathered the scandal and made a comeback. Rather, I think her film career never really got launched simply because she wasn't much of an actress. Without her voice, she wouldn't have been in the shorts she made. Anyway, after the scandal, she married Alderman and the couple soon after retired to live in Colorado Springs away from the spotlight. They probably had a comfortable life, because she had done very well recording more than 150 songs -- including 60 hit tunes, during the decade before she retired. In her divorce settlement with Snyder, she had to pay him $50,000.In the mid-1920s to mid-1930s, Ruth Etting was known as the Sweetheart of radio. She had a distinctive voice and was well-liked as a singer. She was a leading recording artist for more than a decade. Of her 60 hit tunes, some have been etched in musical history. Among them are "Shine On, Harvest Moon," 'Love Me or Leave Me," "Shaking the Blues Away," "You're the Cream in My Coffee," "Button Up Your Overcoat," "Back in Your Own Back Yard," "Dancing With Tears in My Eyes," "It All Depends on You," and "Good Night, Sweetheart."By the way, neither Etting nor Snyder were happy about the way this film turned out.
abenr
The wonderful Doris Day, the brilliant actress of "The Man Who Knew Too Much," is here asked to play Ruth Etting, a singer whose voice bears no resemblance to that of Ms Day. I imagine that difference won't disturb the vast majority of today's audience, few of whom have ever heard Miss Etting, but for those who have -- and you can catch myriads of her songs on YouTube -- the difference is simply a killer. I don't know much about Mr Snyder, but why was the great James Cagney forced to play him as if he were Little Caesar? I also wonder why the director has to show Snyder as Jewish. He has him needlessly say "Mazel Tov" to Miss Etting in one scene.
kjeroh-1
As someone who knew Doris Day primarily through her early 60s romantic comedies, I watched Love Me or Leave Me mainly because I couldn't see pairing her with James Cagney. Right from the start, it is a gripping film. The writing is excellent and performances incredible. I was also thrown by the classification as a musical. Make no mistake: this is not lighthearted fluff, but a potent drama with Doris Day revealing why she was a recording star.Her portrayal of Ruth Etting is done superbly, as a small town woman, but with big city wiles. She is happy to use the James Cagney character (Marty Snyder) to propel her career as long as she can keep him at arm's distance. When he finally pushes back, she loses control of her life.I found the entire film fascinating, from acting, singing and just how one attained fame during those days as a singer. (Selling records was only a small fraction. Besides the clubs it was the compositions of the songs: piano, horns, strings -- all very nicely done.)Love Me or Leave Me is one of the great surprises I've enjoyed watching the presentations from Turner Classic Movies. Powerful, taut and supremely enjoyable with a bit of a surprise ending, it is well worth watching -- and is far from being a "Chick Flick."
writers_reign
In 1955, at almost the chronological mid-point of her film career (1948-1968) Doris Day made what are arguably the two finest films in which she ever appeared, Young At Heart and Love Me Or Leave Me. Both are best classified as Musical Drama and in both she played opposite a character whose screen name was Barney. If co-star Frank Sinatra got to sing the cream of the score in Young At Heart - Just One Of Those Things, Someone To Watch Over Me, One For My Baby, whilst she was stuck with the crowd-pleasing cotton candy confection - Ready, Willing And Able, Hold Me In Your Arms - with which she was identified, in Love Me or Leave Me she got to perform virtually the whole score, which, though not boasting anything like the quality of the Sinatra numbers in YAH was not exactly chopped liver. In both films she was obliged to abandon the role of professional virgin with which she was also identified in favor of semi-pro actress and in both films she managed reasonably well. LOLM is based partly on fact: Singer Ruth Etting did marry Martyn Snyder in 1922 and remained married until 1937; the following year she married Myrl Alderman, remaining married to him until his death in 1966. Whether events were as dramatic as portrayed here is speculative. Suffice it to say that though Cagney walks away with the picture as you would expect Day is only three or four steps behind while Robert Keith (who had played her father in YAH) scores well in the thankless nice-guy role as an agent. Good to watch, good to listen to, what more can I say.
