Nominated for Best Picture of 1940, All This and Heaven Too is, at its heart, a fairly standard melodrama disguising itself as an elaborate costume drama. Set mostly in Paris in the 1840s, it's the tale of an English governess who takes a position caring for the four children of a prominent French "Duc" and "Duchesse." The Duc and Duchesse are unhappily married, primarily because of the hysterical nature of the Duchesse, who seems to want all attention to be paid to her alone. Throughout much of the film, her behavior borders on the truly insane, and she seems to be a danger to herself and her family at times. The Duc strikes up a friendship with the governess, who is kind and gentle and sweet, all things his wife is not. Gossip about the Duc and the governess leads to allegations by the Duchesse, and the Duc winds up being accused of her murder after a particularly tumultuous night. The governess is jailed as well, but she gets set free after the Duc poisons himself rather than implicate her.
Did I mention that the governess is played by Bette Davis? Here she's not her usual fiery self; she's very much restrained and even conservative. The governess' behavior never seems improper, but that does not stop the members of Parisian society from making up tales to fit their own purposes. Davis interacts in a very loving way with the four children of the family, particularly the youngest, a boy who speaks with what sounds like a Southern accent at times (an odd inflection for Paris, which isn't even in the southern part of France). A very young June Lockhart plays the eldest daughter, and the best performance among the children is that of Virginia Weidler as Louise, the next oldest girl. She and Davis seem to relish their time together on screen, particularly when they get to attend the opera with Louise's father, Charles Boyer.
Yes, Charles Boyer, who was so good at playing roguish lovers around this time. Here he's the object of our pity. He seems to have married for prestige, only to be stuck with a wife who is unbearable. The Duchesse is played by Barbara O'Neil, and almost from her first moments on the screen, I didn't like her character or the actress' performance. O'Neil is probably best known for playing Scarlett O'Hara's mother in that Big Movie of 1939, but here she's just too much of a ham. No scenery is safe while she's around. Frankly, I even started to wonder if the children were safe.
Davis and Boyer are an interesting match. They're playing against type here, and it works, for the most part. I tend to prefer them more in the types of roles for which they are best known, but both are actors who can play a variety of parts well. The story seems designed to make the audience want them to be together, perhaps in keeping with the melodramatic structure. It's all perfectly harmless entertainment, an enjoyable way to spend a few hours, but I don't think there's much in the way of analytical fodder here (except perhaps in the possibility of diagnosing what's really wrong with the Duchesse).
I did have one problem with this film. It begins and ends in a school room in the United States. Davis' governess has now taken a position teaching French at a girl's school. Naturally, the gossip from Europe has followed her to her new life, much to her shame. However, after initially fleeing the classroom (never a good idea, especially on the first day), she returns and begins to tell the girls the "truth" about what they've heard or read about her past. For the next two hours, what we see on film is what she tells the girls. The ending is a bit preposterous, but I was astonished that anyone would expect students to sit still for that long listening to a story like this and then react the way that they do. Yes, I know it's filled with Very Dramatic Moments, but it is a very slow build to the "good stuff" in the governess' past. Aside from that, how appropriate is it for a teacher to abandon teaching French and proceed to tell a rather sordid personal story in a room filled with impressionable girls? Wouldn't parents be outraged by this behavior? Alas, it seems doubtful based upon the ending that the girls will ever tell their parents what happened in class that day, so I suppose we should just be grateful that we were allowed to overhear it ourselves.
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