Madame X (1937)

When young lawyer “Raymond” (Raymond Hackett) is tasked with defending a self-confessed murderess, he tries to learn a little of just what drove her to commit a crime that she won’t explain nor attempt to hide from. It’s that retrospective that introduces us to “Madame X”. She (Ruth Chatterton) was a young woman married to an indifferent man “Louis” (Lewis Stone) whose unkindness drove her into the arms of another man. He died quite quickly afterwards, and her jealous husband forbade her access to their three year old son. Disconsolate, the woman took to a path of destitution and absinthe and that ultimately saw her in the courtroom. What we all know, though, is that this young man is the son of the powerful Attorney General of France, and that he - well he has a shame of his own to deal with that goes back many years and of which his son is unaware. She refuses to identify anyone from the story to “Raymond” but the harrowing gist of her tribulations stimulates in him a determination to exonerate a woman whom he considers to have been appallingly treated by her husband and life in general. Stone and Hackett both deliver fine here, but they very much play second fiddle to a Chatterton who is on great form as the beleaguered woman who, in front of our eyes, sees her life disappear into a doldrum of booze and despair. She has quite a lot of help from the make-up department and from a sympathetic production design that adds depth to her sorry tale, and though this isn’t the most quickly paced (melo)drama you will ever see, it’s a fine example of a woman exuding love, pain and even optimism in an environment where she has little, if any, status.