繁荣小镇

A chipper oldie ravishes its spectator with a gung-ho complexion that is so disarming a benignant viewer might be completely oblivious of its cut-throat capitalistic machination which is attendant with the plot's boom-and-bust vagaries.

Two wildcatters Big John McMasters (Gable) and Square John Sand (Tracy) hit it off quickly (thanks to their mutual instinct of dodging potshots), and bouncily go for it in their oil rigging enterprise, there are hits and misses ongoing, but their archetypal bromance is put into a critical test when they are both besotted with the same dame, Betsy Bartlett (Colbert). The narrative cavalierly pass the buck to Betsy since Big John has no inkling that she is Square John’s gal, but Betsy knows Big John alright, which doesn’t stop her from jilting a more matter-of-fact Square John for the newly ignited coup-de-foudre (and it all happened one night!). Thankfully, the reunited Gable-Colbert pair knows how to play the flirtatious bonhomie right, and a bluff Tracy makes a rather surprising capitulation to the “she is not that into him” situation but is never able to get over her, instead, he becomes the watchdog of their marriage, a resolute assurer that Betsy’s happiness is unadulterated.

Therefore, the years-spanning story extends into a series friend-or-foe games between Big John and Square John, predicated on Betsy’s well-being, hopping from places to places, their fortune alternately ebbs and flows. When at its best, an oil wildfire spectacle is surely awe-inspiring through its matted black-and-white expressionism; yet in its worst, the patchy narrative wears thin quickly when the love triangle equilibrium levels out. So an extrinsic force timely arrives in the form of Hedy Lamarr’s drop-dead gorgeous Karen Vanmeer, Big John's business advisor and a socialite who is adept at eavesdropping, as an interloper, she is not beyond reproach but for once, she is presented more than a vacuous bombshell, in fact she has the wiles to apply her own counter-moves when Square John tries to buy her out. And presciently, Spencer Tracy’s courtroom rhetoric is set ablaze in a transitory but consequential moment.

Slightly tortuous in its story-line, and 77 years have passed, Jack Conway’sBOOM TOWN has sustained to evince a pristine luster in pointing up two of the most peddled attributes of America: the land of opportunity and the propitious everything-will-be-fine motto.

referential point: Frank Capra’s IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934, 8.1/10)

强大的卡司，但是不懂男主有什么魅力。虽然男女主是双出轨在一起的，但男主都已经到了婚后还在结婚纪念日和舞女亲密跳舞，有孩子后还出轨的程度，结果女主却依旧爱男主，女主依旧愿意为男主奉献一切，愿意和男主过穷苦日子，甚至为男主寻死觅活……就离谱（女二插足他人婚姻当然不对，但女二该放手时就放手这点正常多了）。男二更是24k纯圣父，男主和他女友在一起，男主闹脾气不理他都没关系，男二超爱，爱到为男女主的爱情放弃自己的事业都无怨无悔的程度。如果说影片是为了反映现实，那男主那些诸如有钱就变坏，没钱才爱老婆，家里红旗不倒外面彩旗飘飘，出轨只图一乐不给出轨对象名份的行为还有女主为了孩子忍了的情节也确实挺真实的。但电影里男主如此女主依旧爱他的设定和圣父男二都已经过分超现实了，所以影片实际上也体现不出什么“真实”。以及依旧不懂男主有什么魅力，可能男主是个能激发他人母性光辉的魅魔吧……