Movie #1061 ........................."The Man Who Played God"

The Man Who Played God --- 1932  --- I would give this 3.8 stars out of 5

After losing his hearing, a musician uses lip-reading to help others.

Director:

 John G. Adolfi

Writers:

 Jules Eckert Goodman (based on the play by), Gouverneur Morris (from the short story by) (as Governeur Morris) , 2 more credits »

Stars:

 George Arliss, Bette Davis, Violet Heming 

Movie #1061 "The Man Who Played God" was on TCM this morning when I was dealing with jet lag and I was drawn into it when a young Bette Davis walked into a scene, and, of course, stole the movie from the others.  She plays a young musical fan of a great mentor (played by George Arliss, whom I know little about except that he was a movie actor in the 1930s). He's a piano player that she loves but he's way too old for her, but she makes a promise to wait for him for 6 months to see how they are then ---- anyway, in the 6 months, he loses his hearing and stops playing music.  He wants to kill himself, but what saves him is learning to read lips.  What he decides to do on a daily basis is use binoculars and read the lips of people who hang out in the park in front of his window, and then he steps in to make people's lives in that park so much better with his money or power.  You can guess that he reads Bette Davis's lips and finds out in the 6 months she has fallen in love with someone else closer in age but intends to keep her promise to him, which he won't let her do......the film is pretty gutsy for the 1930s in that it deals with agism in relationships, loss of faith in god, and lip reading as a solution in the deaf world (controversial).  It was an interesting watch for me --- it didn't make me a George Arliss fan, but it renewed my faith that Bette Davis couldn't make many mistakes in film.